It's a new year, but the world's life-threatening threats remain the same. According to NASA, five asteroids will pass near Earth this January.
Two of the asteroids are minor and would represent a lesser hazard to the world if they collided head-on. On the other hand, the other two are the size of airplanes, and one is the size of a skyscraper.
Space.com said asteroids are stony bodies that orbit the sun but are too tiny to be classified as planets. They're also known as planetoids or tiny planets. There are millions of asteroids, ranging from hundreds of miles to a few feet in diameter. The sizes of all asteroids combined are less than that of Earth's moon.
An illustration, created in March 2021, of NASA’s Psyche spacecraft, which is targeted to launch to the main asteroid belt in August 2022 to investigate the metal-rich asteroid Psyche.
Five Asteroids To Safely Pass By Earth This Month
An asteroid, 2021 YQ, around 220 feet, will pass 1.3 million miles from Earth on January 5. Asteroid 2021 YX will likewise approach Earth on the same day. However, it will be a little further away at 3,846,332 kilometers (2,390,000 miles). This rock is around 100 feet broad, which is about the same size as a small commercial airliner. According to NASA JPL's data, this asteroid has never touched Earth before.
Asteroid 2014 YE15, a bus-sized near-Earth object with a diameter of up to 24 feet, will pass 4.6 million miles distant from Earth, too, on January 6. A small asteroid, 2020 API, with a diameter of 13 feet, will pass Earth on January 7 at a distance of 1.08 million miles, while a gigantic 340-foot (building-sized) object, 2013 YD48, will pass Earth on January 11 at a distance of 3.4 million miles.
Although the average distance between Earth and the moon is around 239,000 miles (385,000 kilometers), NASA (via East Mojo) has not certified the asteroids as potentially harmful objects.
How Dangerous Are Asteroids?
According to NASA, any asteroid smaller than 500 feet in diameter and can't reach Earth closer than 4.6 million miles isn't considered a potentially dangerous item.
Thousands of known asteroids are regularly monitored to see whether one poses a threat to Earth. NASA identifies around 28,000 near-Earth asteroids. None of them are projected to crash with the Earth anytime soon as of this writing.
But asteroids, regardless of their size, might still be harmful. Many have collided with Earth in the past, and more will do so in the future. One of the reasons scientists are interested in asteroids is to learn more about their numbers, orbits, and physical properties. Hence, in November 2021, NASA launched the Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART) mission, the world's first mission to test technology capable of protecting Earth from an approaching space rock.
Next year, the DART mission spacecraft will crash with Dimorphos, a small space rock, at a speed of around four miles per second. Scientists will next establish how much of an impact this has on the object's course through space.
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