NASA Confirms 60 feet Asteroid is on Course for a Close Encounter with Earth
..........
Every night, a network of NASA all-sky cameras
scans the skies above the United States for meteoritic fireballs.
Automated software maintained by NASA's Meteoroid Environment Office
calculates their orbits, velocity, penetration depth in Earth's
atmosphere and many other characteristics. Daily results are presented
here on Spaceweather.com.
Notes:
LD means "Lunar Distance." 1 LD = 384,401 km, the distance between
Earth and the Moon. 1 LD also equals 0.00256 AU. MAG is the visual
magnitude of the asteroid on the date of closest approach.
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All Sky Fireball Network
Every night, a network of NASA all-sky cameras
scans the skies above the United States for meteoritic fireballs.
Automated software maintained by NASA's Meteoroid Environment Office
calculates their orbits, velocity, penetration depth in Earth's
atmosphere and many other characteristics. Daily results are presented
here on Spaceweather.com.
On Dec. 13, 2015, the network reported 29 fireballs.
(15 Geminids, 10 sporadics, 2 December Monocerotids, 1 Quadrantid, 1 alpha Canis Majorid)
(15 Geminids, 10 sporadics, 2 December Monocerotids, 1 Quadrantid, 1 alpha Canis Majorid)
In this diagram of the inner solar system, all of the fireball orbits intersect at a single point--Earth. The orbits are color-coded by velocity, from slow (red) to fast (blue). [Larger image] [movies]
Near Earth Asteroids
Potentially Hazardous Asteroids (PHAs)
are space rocks larger than approximately 100m that can come closer to
Earth than 0.05 AU. None of the known PHAs is on a collision course with
our planet, although astronomers are finding new ones all the time.
On December 13, 2015 there were potentially hazardous asteroids.
Recent & Upcoming Earth-asteroid encounters:
| Asteroid |
Date(UT)
|
Miss Distance
|
Size
|
| 2015 XU169 |
Dec 10
|
9.5 LD
|
16 m
|
| 1998 WT24 |
Dec 11
|
10.9 LD
|
1.1 km
|
| 2015 XA169 |
Dec 12
|
7.4 LD
|
15 m
|
| 2015 XR169 |
Dec 13
|
1.3 LD
|
8 m
|
| 2015 XX128 |
Dec 14
|
2.4 LD
|
25 m
|
| 2015 XX169 |
Dec 14
|
8.4 LD
|
14 m
|
| 2015 XN55 |
Dec 15
|
2.5 LD
|
15 m
|
| 2015 XY261 |
Dec 15
|
0.8 LD
|
16 m
|
| 2015 XL261 |
Dec 17
|
9.7 LD
|
42 m
|
| 2015 XE1 |
Dec 19
|
13.2 LD
|
29 m
|
| 2015 XN261 |
Dec 23
|
2.6 LD
|
31 m
|
| 2011 YD29 |
Dec 24
|
9.7 LD
|
24 m
|
| 2003 SD220 |
Dec 24
|
28.4 LD
|
1.8 km
|
| 2008 CM |
Dec 29
|
22.8 LD
|
1.5 km
|
| 2004 MQ1 |
Jan 2
|
55.4 LD
|
1.1 km
|
| 1999 JV6 |
Jan 6
|
12.6 LD
|
410 m
|
| 1685 Toro |
Jan 22
|
60.9 LD
|
1.7 km
|
| 2001 XR1 |
Jan 23
|
74.4 LD
|
1.5 km
|
| 2015 VC2 |
Jan 28
|
5.8 LD
|
15 m
|
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