Biggest asteroid passes over two million kilometers from Earth, NASA reveals details

Nermin Abbas

The biggest asteroid approaching Earth in 2021 will pass “near our planet” at a distance of more than two million kilometers

Without any risk of collision, the event would allow astronomers to study this celestial body.

And the asteroid, named in 2001 “FO 32” and with a diameter of less than a kilometer, will pass at a speed of 124,000 124 thousand kilometers per hour.

In other words, “faster than most asteroids” that pass close to Earth, according to the US Space Agency (NASA).

The rocky body is expected to pass near the planet on Sunday at 16:02 GMT

And it will be at a distance of two million 16 thousand 158 kilometers from Earth, which is five times greater than the distance between Earth and the Moon.

NASA said: “There is no risk of collision with our planet”, while experts from the Paris Observatory have confirmed that its course is “sufficiently known and disciplined” to make it possible to exclude any danger.

However, the rocky body is classified as “somewhat dangerous”, like all asteroids whose orbit is less than 19.5 times the distance between Earth and the Moon and more than 140 meters in diameter.

The French Observatory declared that this category: “Observed relentlessly by astronomers

All over the world to develop the smallest details possible, ”indicating that the first – and largest – asteroid, Ceres, was discovered in 1801.

The asteroid “FO 32” was first detected in 2001 and has been closely monitored since then.

It is part of the “Apollo” family of near-Earth asteroids, which will orbit the sun in at least a year from now and can pass through Earth orbit.

“Currently, we don’t know much about this object, so its passage will give us a wonderful opportunity to learn a lot about it,” said Lance Penner, a scientist at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory.

The Thrust Center’s Near-Earth Object Center said that “it is assumed that astronomers in the southern hemisphere and at lower northern latitudes will be able to see the asteroid.”

Florent Delphi of the Paris Observatory told AFP:

“We will have to wait until dark and have a good telescope at least eight inches in diameter.”

He explained that “we should see a white point moving like a satellite”.

Its path is different from that of meteors forming a bright line across the sky in tenths of a second.

NASA said none of the large asteroids would hit Earth in the next century, but added

“The more information we collect about these crimes, the more we can prepare to expel them in case any of them threaten Earth.”

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