News
Doomsday asteroid... is not to come in February 2017!
The news is slowly widespreading over the Internet... According to the DailyMail online, a "self-proclaimed astronomer", Dr Dyomin Damir Zakharovich, predicts that an asteroid will crash on the Earth on February 16th, 2017, creating a mega-tsunami...
The asteroid is known: 2016 WF9, an Apollo-type asteroid, was discovered by NEOWISE (Near Earth Object Wide field Infrared Survey Explorer) on November 27th, 2016, and its size is currently estimated to be around 400 m diameter. It will cross the ecliptic plane in mid-February, but according to modelizations, based on 61 past observations of the small body, it will be 53 millions of kilometers from our planet on February 16th... and will actually at its closest point to the Earth 9 days later, on February 25th, but always at a respectful distance of more than 51 millions of kilometers. So be sure everybody will be safe on February 16th! Or at least, if anything happens, it won't have anything to do with asteroids! Or at least, not this one!
Relative positions in 3D of the inner Solar System planets and the asteroid 2016 WF9 on February 16th (Doomsday, according to Dr Dyomin Damir Zakharovich) and February 25th (closest approach), 2017. Credit: NASA/JPL
What is real, on the other hand, is that another small asteroid (5 to 10 m diameter), 2017 BH30, was discovered on January 29th, 2017 by the Catalina Sky Survey, and came as close as 35 000 km from the Earth surface on January 30th, 04h 59 UT. It was around +13.6mag at that time. The same visual magnitude as another small rock (2017 BS32) that will pass at 150 000 km from Earth surface tomorrow (February 2nd, 2017), so 4 times further than 2017 BH30, but as it is a bit bigger (10 to 20 m diameter), it is brighter, so appears nearly as bright as the previous one.
Near Earth asteroid 2017 BH30 photographed by Gianluca Masi, at the time it was 500 000 km, on a safe approach trajectory. At that time, the asteroid had an apparent speed of 36"/minute! Credit: Gianluca Masi, The Virtual Telescope Project
Again, no need to worry about that! The best it could lead to, is a wonderful sight at those small bodies, that are so close to us that you can actually see them moving across the still starry sky (in an astronomical instrument). And if one of them comes close enough to enter the atmosphere (this was only observed twice before, with 2008 TC3 and 2014 AA), then it would be a dramatic display for observers lucky enough to be able to see it, as it will lead to a wonderful fireball, and potential meteorite hunting!