The cosmos is definitely very excited at the start of 2023. A large asteroid will fly again this Saturday between the Earth and the Moon, an event not dangerous, but which will serve as a planetary defense exercise, as we learned on Friday from the European Space Agency (ESA).
The asteroid was first discovered on February 27 by an observatory in La Palma, one of Spain’s Canary Islands. It will pass this Saturday at 19:49 GMT at about 175,000 km from Earth (a third of the distance that separates us from the Moon) at a speed of 28,000 km/h.
2023 DZ2 is estimated to have a diameter of 40 to 70 meters, which is enough to wipe out a major city if it collides with our planet. But there’s nothing to worry about, said Richard Moissle, head of ESA’s planetary defense office.
rare situation
Small asteroids fly overhead every day. In early March, seven of them even touched down on Earth. But, according to Richard Moissle, the passage of such a large object so close to the blue planet occurs only once every ten years. Therefore, the International Asteroid Warning Network decided to take advantage of this proximity, and 2023 DZ2 will be analyzed using a range of tools such as spectrometers and radars.
The goal is to learn everything there is to know about the asteroid in just one week, says the scientist. He added that this would serve as a practice for how the network would “respond to such a threat” in the future.
According to astronomers’ calculations, the asteroid will again fly by the Earth in 2026, but at a greater distance and will not pose a risk of collision for at least the next 100 years.
In early March, astronomers discovered an asteroid of the same size, 2023 DW, and estimated the risk of impact with Earth at 1 in 432 in 2046. But after more accurate calculations, this probability has decreased, and now any risk is excluded. .
If such an object ever came close to us, the Earth would not be defenseless. Last year, NASA’s DART spacecraft deliberately crashed into the asteroid Dimorphos, located about 11 million kilometers from Earth, and managed to change its course.
Source: Le Parisien
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