NASA expects the asteroid to visit our planet on what has been called a “close approach” trajectory. The space rock is racing towards our planet at speeds of about 14.80km per second or 33,106mph (53,280km/h).
At this rate, NASA said the asteroid will approach the planet shortly after noon on Thursday, February 20.
NASA’s asteroid trackers at the Centre for Near Earth Object Studies (CNEOS) predict the space rock will be closest to Earth around 12.09pm GMT (7.09am EST) tomorrow.
The news comes one year after NASA’s tracking systems spotted the asteroid in the solar system.
NASA has since named the space rock Asteroid 2019 BE5 and determined it is an Aten-type near-Earth object (NEO).
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Aten-type rocks are asteroids barreling around the solar system on a trajectory similar to Asteroid 2062 Aten.
NEOs are all comets and asteroids that approach the Sun within 1.3 astronomical units.
According to the European Space Agency (ESA), NEOs frequently visit Earth’s corner of space – sometimes too close for comfort.
ESA said: “NEOs could potentially hit our planet and, depending on their size, produce considerable damage.
“While the chance of a large object hitting Earth is very small, it would produce a great deal of destruction.
“NEOs thus merit active detection and tracking efforts.”
NEOs can occasionally approach close to Earth
NASA
Based on NASA’s estimates, Asteroid BE5 measures somewhere in the range of 82ft to 187ft (25m to 57m) across.
At the lower end of the estimate, the space rock is big enough to punch through the planet’s atmosphere and hit the ground.
NASA said: “Space rocks smaller than about 25m – about 82ft – will most likely burn up as they enter the Earth’s atmosphere and cause little or no damage.
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If a rocky meteoroid larger than 25 meters but smaller than one kilometre – a little more than half-a-mile – were to hit Earth, it would likely cause local damage to the impact area.”
At the upper end of NASA’s estimate, the asteroid is comparable in height to the Leaning Tower of Pisa in Italy.
But just how close does NASA expect the asteroid to come to Earth tomorrow?
At its closest, BE5 will approach us from a distance of about 0.03508 astronomical units.
One astronomical unit measures the distance from our planet to the Sun – about 93 million miles (149.6 million km).
In other words, the space rock will miss us by about 3.2 million miles (5.25 million km).
NASA said: “As they orbit the Sun, NEOs can occasionally approach close to Earth.
“Note that a ‘close’ passage astronomically can be very far away in human terms: millions or even tens of millions of kilometres.”
After tomorrow, the asteroid will make a close approach to Mercury on May 3, 2020.
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