Asteroid & Comet Watch.
March 10, 2013
An asteroid the size of a city-block is passed close to Earth Saturday evening. This is the latest in a series of celestial objects passing through the suburbs of our planet in recent weeks.
Discovered not long ago, the asteroid 2013 ET is passed at a distance of 950'000 km to Earth, at the speed of 42'000 km/h, at 2030 GMT Saturday (21h30 Swiss time). This is about two and a half times the Earth-Moon distance, or very little at astronomical level. "The scary part is that we did not know him," said Patrick Paolucci, president of Slooh Space Camera.
Artist's view of asteroids passing very close our planet. Image credit: NASA
Two other small asteroids are made or had to spend this weekend in the suburbs of the Earth. Called the 2013 EC 20 has "slipped" to 150,000 km from us, and this Sunday, 2013 EN 20 had to go to 449'000 km. The one and the other were discovered only three days ago.
The asteroid 2013 ET is almost eight times larger (measuring 140 meters long) than the meteorite that exploded when it enters the atmosphere, the sky Chelyabinsk in the Urals, February 15. The power of the explosion, about 440 kilotons of dynamite, released a shock-wave that broke windows and damaged buildings, and hundreds injured.
Slooh's 1st Look of Asteroid 2013 ET taken from Canary Island
The same day, another small asteroid, DA14, had risen to only 27'680 km from Earth, closer than geostationary satellites.
More information about asteroids and near-Earth objects is at: http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/asteroidwatch
Slooh Space Camera: http://www.slooh.com/slooh-home.php
Image, Text, Credits: ATS / NASA / Translation: Orbiter.ch Aerospace.
Cheers, Orbiter.ch
