A newly discovered asteroid named 2017 BH30 made the closest flyby since September 6, 2016 on January 30, 2017.
2017 BH30 belongs to Apollo group of asteroids. It was discovered by Catalina Sky Survey on January 29, 2017. Are we still safe?
After January 24 and January 9, another newly discovered truck-sized asteroid gave Earth a real close shave on January 30, 2017.
The estimated size of the newly discovered space rock is between 4.6 and 10 m (15 – 32.8 feet). The asteroid is flying at an speed of 15.46 km/s relative to Earth.
The large space body flew by at 04:57 UTC on January 30, 2017 at a distance of only 0.17 LD (65 280 km / 40 563 miles) from Earth’s surface.
This is the closest known asteroid flyby since September 6, 2016.
The last-minute detection of 2017 BH30 is just another example of how blind we are to the millions of NEOs that could smack into our planet and release many atomic bombs’ worth of energy.
Now imagine 300,000 much-larger rocks out there that are big enough and moving fast enough to wipe out a major city. OMG!
