When you purchase through links on our site , we may realise an affiliate delegation . Here ’s how it works .
lately last calendar month , a mammoth asteroid larger than the Great Pyramid of Gizahurtled between Earth and the moon at more than 21,000 mph ( 34,000 km / h ) . The rarefied , radical - tight encounter appropriate astronomers to becharm the first - ever pictures of the space careen , which revealed that the near - Earth object was lightly knocked off course by our planet ’s gravitative pull — forever change the asteroid ’s journey around the Dominicus .
The asteroid , named 2024 MK , is roughly 500 feet ( 150 time ) across , making itbig enough to wipe out a great city . The " potentially risky " space rock , which has an atypical and elongated figure , was first discern barreling toward Earth on June 16 by theNASA - fund Asteroid Terrestrial - impact Last Alert System ( ATLAS ) in South Africa .
New “bistatic” images of asteroid 2024 MK show that the space rock has had its solar orbit altered by a recent close approach to Earth.
On June 29 , just 13 days after it was discovered , 2024 MK reached its close point to Earth as it skimmed our satellite ’s orbit at a space of around 184,000 naut mi ( 295,000 kilometers ) — or around three - quarters of the distance between Earth andthe moon .
Astronomers at NASA ’s Goldstone Deep Space Communications Complex in California monitored the flyby using the GoldstoneSolar SystemRadar telescope . By bouncing radio waves off the space rock as it shot past Earth , the team create grainy " bistatic " image of the asteroid , which help them determine its exact anatomy and map out out the concavities and ridge on its surface . Thenew photoswere released July 3 by NASA ’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory ( JPL ) .
Just two days before the flyby , on June 27 , the same scope also captured image of the much larger " planet killer " asteroid 2011 UL21 as itpassed by our planet at a distance of around 4.1 million statute mile ( 6.6 million kilometer ) . These pictures discover that this peck - size space rockhas a secluded moon hiding in its orbit .
2024 MK’s orbit takes it far away from Earth and into the asteroid belt.
touch : No , NASA has n’t warned of an impending asteroid ten-strike in 2038 . Here ’s what really happened .
The new watching of 2024 MK bring out that the space rock music ’s flight has shifted since it was first discovered . This is probable because Earth gravitationally tugged on the asteroid as it pass by us , overstretch it slightly closer to our major planet .
This alteration was quite substantial . The asteroid antecedently orbitedthe sunevery 3.3 years , expend most of its time in the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter . However , scientists now conceive that it will take 24 few days to complete the route , according to JPL .
— Could scientists halt a ' major planet orca ' asteroid from hitting Earth ?
— NASA ’s most want : The 5 most dangerous asteroids to Earth
— ' major planet killer ' asteroids are hide in the Lord’s Day ’s glare . Can we stop them in time ?
But fortuitously , " its future motion shows that it [ still ] does not pose a threat to our planet for the foreseeable futurity , " NASA congressman spell in a statement .
MK 2024 was primitively schedule to make its next close approach to Earth in 3037 . However , this could now happen several month to begin with than expected due to its new orbital trajectory . It is now unclear how close it will get to us or if our planet ’s somberness will further spay its sphere .
