NASA says asteroid passing near Earth on Thursday is ‘potentially hazardous object’
Misty Severi
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A large asteroid that is approximately the size of the main span of the Brooklyn Bridge is expected to pass near Earth on Thursday, making it a “potentially hazardous object,” according to NASA.
The asteroid, which is 1,600 feet long, is expected to pass within 2.6 million miles of the Earth on Thursday afternoon. Any object larger than about 460 feet that passes within 4.6 million miles of Earth is considered “potentially hazardous,” even if it poses no risk of colliding with the planet.
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The asteroid, known as 2020 DB5, is being monitored by NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California. The same asteroid has passed near the Earth before. Its most recent visit was in 1995, and it is not expected to swing back around until 2048 after Thursday, according to the lab. It has come near Earth six times since 1905.
2020 DB5 is the largest of five asteroids that will pass Earth this week. Three of them already passed on Tuesday and Wednesday. One of the asteroids, which was the size of a house, came within 197,000 miles of Earth. The final asteroid will pass on Saturday from 3.2 million miles away.
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NASA has increased its efforts to protect humans from asteroids in recent years and from other space objects that pose a threat to the planet. For example, the space agency established the Planetary Defense Coordination Office in 2016, which documents near-Earth objects that could crash into Earth in order to help fend off disastrous collisions.
Another example occurred in September when NASA crashed a spacecraft into an asteroid to change its trajectory. The crash was part of its Double Asteroid Redirection Test mission.