[ad_1]
In the weeks leading up to Halloween, you will probably hear scary stories about a skull-like asteroid doing a near-Earth flyby on Oct. 31.
Do not be afraid. The stories are not quite correct.
The 2015 asteroid TB145 – dubbed "the asteroid Halloween", the "comet of death" and even the "big pumpkin" – first appeared in 2015 when it zoomed the Earth October 31. The radar images of the original observatory a wide asteroid made it seem rather menacing, resembling a celestial version of a giant human skull with two deep and black basins for the eyes and an empty place for the nose.
Later, radar images showed that the scary asteroid was a rock more regular than the skull, but that did not prevent the scary names from sticking. Now, the 2015 TB145 asteroid is about to make its comeback and many people are resurrecting Trick or Treat stories.
It's a bad time this year.
The 2015 TB145 asteroid will fly only on November 11 and will be much farther from Earth than its previous appearance – some 24 million miles from the 2015 300,000 mile.
The "dead" part of the name of the comet is accurate, however.
According to NASA scientists, this is probably a "dead comet" that has lost its volatile materials after many passages under the sun.
"We found that the object reflects about six percent of the light it receives from the sun," said Vishnu Reddy, a researcher at the Planetary Science Institute in Tucson, Arizona. "It sounds like fresh asphalt, and while here on Earth, we think it's quite dark, it's brighter than a typical comet that thinks only 3 to 5% of the light.This suggests that it could be of cometary origin – but there is no obvious coma, the conclusion is that it is a dead comet. "
Although this year's comet does not appear in time for a tip or treatment, it will make another appearance on October 31st. The comet will appear again on Halloween day in 2088, zooming around the Earth at about 20 lunar distances.
Source link
