The Solar System is far from being the extremely friendly place that most of us like to believe. It’s also home to the asteroid belt located between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter. There are millions of asteroids dwelling in that region.
Obviously, you can never know when an asteroid will become activated and head towards us. Unfortunately, such an asteroid could be a lot bigger than what humanity would be able to handle, even with its most powerful gears.
The 1989 JA asteroid measures 1.8 km wide
HindustanTimes.com reveals the news about the asteroid known as 1989 JA, saying that NASA itself has raised awareness about the space rock. 1989 JA measures 1.8 km wide, and it’s approaching our planet. Luckily, there’s no reason to worry, as the space rock will safely miss us in late May 2022. Due to its enormous size, the asteroid has been labeled as ‘potentially hazardous. The space rock is also hurtling through space at an incredible speed of more than 47,000 km/h.
Speaking of potentially hazardous asteroids, NASA aims to give more attention to the Apophis asteroid, which has a diameter of 370 meters. In 2029, the space agency will launch the OSIRIS-REx probe to the space rock to study it.
DellaGiustina from the University of Arizona stated as skyandtelescope.org quotes:
Osiris-APEX will detect Apophis about three weeks before the asteroid’s close encounter with Earth, giving us time to monitor its rotation rate before and after the close encounter,
After that the spacecraft will spend 18 months surveying the asteroid, including going into a close orbit around this small object.
As far as astronomers know, the Apophis asteroid won’t hit Earth either.
In the end, you’ll need to worry about anything else rather than the 1989 JA asteroid, Apophis, or any other discovered space rock. And if you’ve marked an Armageddon event in your calendar already in order to go for a party in late May, we need to disappoint you and announce that you should delete the event from your schedule.
