NASA spots tiny asteroid buzzing by Earth, closest flyby ever recorded

An asteroid the size of an SUV passed 2,950 kilometers above Earth, NASA said on August 18. This is reportedly the closest asteroid ever observed passing by our planet, NASA added.

 NASA records a small asteroid becomes closest ever seen pasisng the Earth

In a statement, NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) said, "If it had been on a collision course with Earth, the asteroid -- named 2020 QG -- would likely not have caused any damage, instead of disintegrating in the atmosphere, creating a fireball in the sky, or a meteor." 

The asteroid was about 3-6 metres (10-20 feet) long and had passed over the Southern Indian Ocean on Sunday at 4:08 GMT. The speed of the same was approximately eight miles per second (12.3 kilometres per second) and it passed below the geostationary orbit of about 22,000 miles at which most telecommunication satellites fly.

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Zwicky Transient Facility, a telescope at the Palomar Observatory at the California Institute of Technology was used to record the first six hours of the asteroid after its approach and it was seen as a long trail of light in the sky. 

The space agency of the US said that there have been many times when the asteroids of a similar size have passed Earth at a similar distance almost every year. But it is very hard to record such asteroids until they are directly heading towards the planet. In 2013, Chelyabinsk, Russia had recorded a similar asteroid of the same size and distance passing the planet which caused an explosion. 

It was due to this explosion of this object which was around 66 feet long has windows were shattered for miles, injuring a thousand people. NASA these days is on a mission to monitor the larger asteroids (460 feet) continuously which may pose threat to the planet; but at times the equipment used in the mission also helps to track smaller objects. 

Paul Chodas, the director of the Center for Near-Earth Object Studies at NASA said, "It's really cool to see a small asteroid come by this close because we can see the Earth's gravity dramatically bends its trajectory." 

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