NASA took to Twitter to detail the possibility of a newly discovered asteroid – 2023 DW. The asteroid has a chance of hitting earth in 2046. “Often when new objects are first discovered, it takes several weeks of data to reduce the uncertainties and adequately predict their orbits years into the future,” the tweet explained.
The live tracker shows the asteroid passing through space alongside movement trackers and other details.
The asteroid is measured at 49.29m and takes 271 days to complete one solar orbit.
2023 DW is set to approach earth on the closest date being February 14, 2046. As of recent data, the asteroid’s nearest distance to earth is 1,828,086 kilometres.
NASA explained that orbit analysts will continue to monitor the asteroid and continue to update predictions based on data received.
According to NASA, the earth gets hit by asteroids all the time as small asteroids and tiny particles hit the planet regularly. However, the vast majority of these impactors are small and burn in the atmosphere.
The last significant impact was in Russia in 2013. The earth got hit by an asteroid of, what NASA describes, as the size of a small building. It disintegrated about 20 kilometres above the city of Chelyabinsk and deposited meteorites in the ground.
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