A potentially hazardous asteroid named “Asteroid 4179 Toutatis”, is about 3 miles wide and will be flying by Earth in a cosmic “near-miss”. The asteroid will be about 4.4 million miles away from Earth at it’s closest approach, that’s about 18x the distance of the Moon. Fortunately, the asteroid will be just passing by but if it were to collide with Earth, it would most certainly be catastrophic.
This isn’t the only asteroid getting up close and personal with Earth as another smaller asteroid (about 2.1 miles wide) named 2012 XE54 just squeezed between Earth and the Moon earlier today at a distance of just 141,000 miles from Earth. This pass was much much closer, close enough for Earth to be able to cast it’s shadow on the asteroid.
Video of Asteroid Toutatis Orbit 2012 – courtesy NASA JPL
This is a live feed of the 4179 Toutatis event, you get more detailed information information including the abillity to switch channels at www.slooh.com.
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