THE BLUE STATES ARE MOSTLY COASTAL


There’s a chance a 50m-wide asteroid could collide with planet Earth later this year.

Asteroids and space matter traveling close to earth are constantly monitored by NASA and the space agency’s European counterpart, and their tracking data shows that one will soon be flying uncomfortably close.

While potentially hazardous asteroids regularly pass Earth without issue, on September 9, a rock known as 2006 QV89 will make its closest approach to Earth in some time.

The asteroid would be the largest recorded space rock to hit planet Earth.

A remote area of Siberia was struck by the biggest recorded asteroid in 1908, and the resulting seismic shockwaves registered with barometers as far away as England.

"A century later some still debate the cause and come up with different scenarios that could have caused the explosion," said Don Yeomans, manager of the Near-Earth Object Office at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory.

While an asteroid of that size isn’t a potential planet destroyer, it is large enough to cause significant damage if it struck populated land and could cause a tsunami if it touched down in the ocean.


https://www.9news.com.au/world/space-asteroid-has-slim-chance-of-colliding-with-earth/96b463e3-d9b1-40b1-827e-fa69f8c1e475