Asteroid with a speed of more than 32,000 km/h is about to pass by Earth
A "potentially hazardous" asteroid will come within 5 million kilometers of Earth in late August.
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Asteroid moving at high speed in space. Photo:Mirror. |
2016 NF23, an asteroid with an estimated diameter of 70 - 160 m, is about to fly close to Earth,MirrorIt will not collide but will pass more than 5 million kilometers from the blue planet on August 29, according to NASA.
The asteroid is traveling at about 32,500 km/h and is classified as “potentially hazardous”. Asteroids that come within 7.48 million km of Earth and are larger than 150 m in diameter are classified in this category. If they hit Earth, they could destroy an entire city and kill millions of people.
2016 NF23 "visited" Earth just a few weeks after asteroid 2010 WC9. This asteroid passed by 203,000 km, about half the distance from Earth to the Moon, on May 15. According to astronomers, this is the closest approach of 2010 WC9 in the next 300 years.
