Potentially Hazardous' Giant Asteroid Spanning 400 Feet Just Whizzed Past Earth

 Asteroid 2013 BO76, which was approaching Earth on Thursday, has not impacted the planet, but it was the closest asteroid to pass Earth in 2022. The asteroid maintained its course at a speed of 50,000 kmph and the width of the asteroid is almost 500 meters. NASA had declared the asteroid as a potentially hazardous one. A Twitter handle by the name Near-Earth Objects shared the details for the asteroid. “Object name is 2013 BO76 and it is potentially hazardous, close approach date is March 24, estimated diameter varies from 202.56 to 452.94 meters and the relative velocity is 49513.45km/h," the tweet said.The asteroid is said to be the size of the Empire State Building and the gap between Earth and the asteroid is said to have been 3.1 million miles which is approximately 13 times that of the distance between our planet and the moon. NASA’s list of “Close Approaches" had this asteroid mentioned in it. But the asteroid did not pose any threat as the direction of the asteroid didn’t change and the asteroid stayed in its course.

A lot of Near Earth Objects (NEO) are tracked all the time to understand if any of them pose any threat to us so that governments around the world can issue warnings if a potential collision is imminent. If the gravitational field of Earth deviates any of these asteroids’ path, they might be trapped in our gravitational field and change their course to directly collide Earth and the size of the catastrophe hence caused could vary depending on the size and velocity of the asteroid.Asteroid 2013 BO76 was one of the seven NEOs that were expected to pass Earth on March 24, 2022.

Fortunately none of the 7 objects impacted Earth or posed any risk to the planet. Since the extinction of dinosaurs, our Earth has never collided with an asteroid that could endanger civilization or even a city. But as these objects keep moving through, it is important for space organisations to always keep a track and make sure they warn everyone well in advance.