Asteroid 2020 PT4: Airplane-size asteroid to fly very close to Earth today, know more

NASA is currently tracking the course of many asteroids that will fly by close to our home planet. The space agency has something known as the Asteroid Watch Widget on its website. This widget displays the date of closest approach of space objects like asteroids and comets to our planet. It also states their approximate diameter, relative size, and distance from Earth. Most recently NASA’s widget is featuring, the ginormous Asteroid 2020 PT4. The asteroid seems to have already arrived dangerously close to Earth and is the size of a large plane. Read on to find out more about the space rock.

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Asteroid 2020 PT4 has arrived close to Earth

A report on NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory website has revealed that at the point of its closest approach, Asteroid 2020 PT4 will only be 0.01266 astronomical units (AU) from Earth. In miles, the asteroid will be 1,180,000 miles from Earth and in terms of kilometres, it will be 1893909.043 km from our home planets surface. While these numbers make it sound like the 110 feet Asteroid is not close enough but in astronomical terms, it is already dangerously close. Hence, NASA has classified this space as a Near-Earth Object (NEO). In Lunar Distance the asteroid is 4.93 LD away from Earth.

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Here’s what we know about Asteroid 2020 PT4

The space object is approaching Earth at the relative velocity of 12.56 km/s. While NASA had earlier estimated on its website that the asteroid is within the range of 27-60 m. But it has now determined that the asteroid is approximately 33 m. NASA has also classified Asteroid among the Apollo class of near-earth Asteroids. 

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What time will Asteroid 2020 PT4 make its closest approach?

According to NASA’s website, the space rock will make its closest approach to Earth at 15:52 UTC. In terms of the Pacific Time (PT), this will be 8:52 am, Tuesday and 11:52 am Tuesday in Eastern Time (ET). NASA has also classified Asteroid 2020 PT4 among the Apollo class of near-earth asteroids. 

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Another Asteroid made a close by on September 1

On September 1, asteroid 2011 ES4 had come very close to the Earth, it was even closer than the Moon. The estimated distance of the asteroid 2011 ES4 from Earth was 1.2 lakh kilometres. Another space rock named Asteroid 2020 QG5 approached Earth again after 16 years on the very same day. Clearly none of these asteroids was a threat to our planet.