Worried about trick or treaters? Worry about something else instead:
‘Spooky’: the 1,300ft-wide asteroid to hurtle close to Earth on Halloween
TB145, a medium-sized chunk of rock and ice could that cause ‘continental-scale devastation’, will fly by at a distance slightly farther away than the moonA large asteroid discovered only weeks ago will tear past the Earth on Halloween, Nasa has announced, estimating that it will come closer than any object of its size in the next 20 years.
The asteroid, nicknamed “the Great Pumpkin” and “Spooky” but technically known as TB145, is an estimated 1,300ft (400 meters) wide – 20 times bigger than the meteorite that screamed across the Russian sky and exploded over Chelyabinsk in 2013, shattering windows with shock waves and debris that injured more than a thousand people.
The Chelyabinsk object entered the atmosphere at about 12 miles (19km) per second. TB145 will fly past at around 22 miles per second (78,300mph), about 300,000 miles (483,000km) from Earth, slightly farther than the moon.
Scientists at Nasa’s Center for Near-Earth Object Studies discovered TB145 on 10 October and announced it to the public this week. The asteroid will make its closest approach on 31 October at about 1.05pm ET (5.05pm GMT). Nasa estimates that no similar object will make a comparable approach until 2027…
http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/oct/23/spooky-tb145-asteroid-close-to-earth-halloween
Yet it was only discovered 14 days ago, so how can they say that no similar object will come near us in the next 22 years? Its not even as though they re actively searching for asteroids coming our way, not ones that are smaller than 1000 metres anyway; a ikm ball of rock is going to wipe out life on earth just as efficiently as a 900m ball of rock, yet one would be the cause of all sorts of panic upon discovery whilst the other would be ignored. And a 400m ball of rock is going to do more than bust a few windows and make that days lead headline on the TV news anyway.
By: snafu - 31st October 2015 at 22:48
Oh and, if you are reading this, we must have survived.
By: snafu - 31st October 2015 at 10:17
Scientists say it will not hit us for a least 100 years.
Well, thats nice…
By: John Green - 26th October 2015 at 12:27
That’s the spirit. There’s hope for you yet !
By: Meddle - 25th October 2015 at 21:42
Just another excuse for prices to go up.
The NHS is under enough strain as it is, without a 1,300ft-wide asteroid coming over here. I bet its called Muhammad or something like that. Why isn’t it staying up in space fighting ISIS? Bunch of cowards, these asteroids. One of those ‘enricher’ asteroids the Blairite government forced upon us. Come to think of it, Benidorm isn’t even British any more either. I would emigrate while you still can. Gone to the dogs, so it has.
By: TonyT - 25th October 2015 at 01:01
Whatever it might be there’s nothing we can do about it. So – now what about those damn trickle treaters??!!;)
I don’t know, it might be the best excuse to fire Bruce Willis off into space.
By: John Green - 24th October 2015 at 21:17
Just another excuse for prices to go up.
By: charliehunt - 24th October 2015 at 19:44
Whatever it might be there’s nothing we can do about it. So – now what about those damn trickle treaters??!!;)
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October 24, 2015 at 7:36 pm