An asteroid about 50 meters in diameter, discovered on February 26, has a trajectory that poses a small risk of hitting Earth on February 14, 2046, the US space agency revealed Thursday.
“We have been tracking a new asteroid called 2023 DW that has a very low probability of hitting Earth in 2046. Often when new objects are first discovered, several weeks of data are needed to reduce uncertainties and adequately predict their orbits. in the future”, explains NASA in its Twitter account dedicated to monitoring asteroids.
The closest approach of the asteroid to Earth is scheduled for February 14, 2046, 1.8 million kilometers from the planet, says the same source, quoted by the Efe agency.
NASA orbit analysts will continue to monitor asteroid 2023 DW and update predictions as more data becomes available.
The asteroid, discovered from the MAP San Pedro de Atacama Observatory in Chile, has an estimated diameter of 49 meters and is currently 0.12 astronomical units from Earth, circulating at a relative speed of 24.63 with respect to the Sun. kilometers per second (more than 88 thousand kilometers per hour).
Its orbital period is 271 days.
The European Space Agency’s Near-Earth Object Coordination Center forecast Wednesday at a 1 in 625 chance of a direct hit, but those odds are recalculated daily.
Source: TSF
