[meteorite-list] Record Setting Asteroid Flyby (Asteroid 2012 DA14)

From: Jodie Reynolds <spacerocks_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Mon, 28 Jan 2013 15:55:32 -0800
Message-ID: <36102513.20130128155532_at_spaceballoon.org>

Thanks for the heads-up!

If you're in Asia, you might be able to catch it for a short flare to
Mag 7ish with decent binoculars. Consult a good piece of planetarium
software for a skymap because there will be significant parallax and
it'll be bookin' across our view.

No realistic shot at imaging it for us amateurs in the Northern
Hemisphere at Mag 24-22.

--- Jodie

Monday, January 28, 2013, 2:08:00 PM, you wrote:


> http://science.nasa.gov/science-news/science-at-nasa/2013/28jan_2012da/

> Record Setting Asteroid Flyby
> NASA Science News

> Jan. 28, 2013: Talk about a close shave. On Feb. 15th an asteroid
> about half the size of a football field will fly past Earth only 17,200
> miles above our planet's surface. There's no danger of a collision, but
> the space rock, designated 2012 DA14, has NASA's attention.

> "This is a record-setting close approach," says Don Yeomans of NASA's
> Near Earth Object Program at JPL. "Since regular sky surveys began in
> the 1990s, we've never seen an object this big get so close to Earth."

> Earth's neighborhood is littered with asteroids of all shapes and sizes,
> ranging from fragments smaller than beach balls to mountainous rocks
> many kilometers wide. Many of these objects hail from the asteroid belt,
> while others may be corpses of long-dead, burnt out comets. NASA's
> Near-Earth Object Program helps find and keep track of them, especially
> the ones that come close to our planet.

> 2012 DA14 is a fairly typical near-Earth asteroid. It measures some 50
> meters wide, neither very large nor very small, and is probably made of
> stone, as opposed to metal or ice. Yeomans estimates that an asteroid
> like 2012 DA14 flies past Earth, on average, every 40 years, yet
> actually strikes our planet only every 1200 years or so.

> The impact of a 50-meter asteroid is not cataclysmic--unless you happen
> to be underneath it. Yeomans points out that a similar-sized object
> formed the mile wide Meteor Crater in Arizona when it struck about
> 50,000 years ago. "That asteroid was made of iron," he says, "which made
> it an especially potent impactor." Also, in 1908, something about the
> size of 2012 DA14 exploded in the atmosphere above Siberia, leveling
> hundreds of square miles of forest. Researchers are still studying the
> "Tunguska Event" for clues to the impacting object.

> "2012 DA14 will definitely not hit Earth," emphasizes Yeomans. "The
> orbit of the asteroid is known well enough to rule out an impact."

> Even so, it will come interestingly close. NASA radars will be
> monitoring the space rock as it approaches Earth closer than many
> man-made satellites. Yeomans says the asteroid will thread the gap
> between low-Earth orbit, where the ISS and many Earth observation
> satellites are located, and the higher belt of geosynchronous
> satellites, which provide weather data and telecommunications.

> "The odds of an impact with a satellite are extremely remote," he says.
> Almost nothing orbits where DA14 will pass the Earth.

> NASA's Goldstone radar in the Mojave Desert is scheduled to ping 2012
> DA14 almost every day from Feb. 16th through 20th. The echoes will not
> only pinpoint the orbit of the asteroid, allowing researchers to better
> predict future encounters, but also reveal physical characteristics such
> as size, spin, and reflectivity. A key outcome of the observing campaign
> will be a 3D radar map showing the space rock from all sides.

> During the hours around closest approach, the asteroid will brighten
> until it resembles a star of 8th magnitude. Theoretically, that's an
> easy target for backyard telescopes. The problem, points out Yeomans, is
> speed. "The asteroid will be racing across the sky, moving almost a full
> degree (or twice the width of a full Moon) every minute. That's going to
> be hard to track." Only the most experienced amateur astronomers are
> likely to succeed.

> Those who do might experience a tiny chill when they look at their
> images. That really was a close shave.

> For more information about 2012 DA and other asteroids of interest,
> visit NASA's Near-Earth Object Program web site: http://neo.jpl.nasa.gov


> Author: Dr. Tony Phillips
> Production editor: Dr. Tony Phillips
> Credit: Science at NASA

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-- 
Best regards,
 Jodie                            mailto:spacerocks at spaceballoon.org

Received on Mon 28 Jan 2013 06:55:32 PM PST