Russian Scientists Report Asteroid Near-Miss

[jakeXT]

MOSCOW, September 30 (RIA Novosti) – A 15-meter (approximately 50 feet) asteroid, similar to the one that exploded above Russia in February, was detected hours before it narrowly missed the Earth over the weekend, Russian scientists said.

Vladimir Lipunov of the Moscow State University and the Sternberg Astronomical Institute said on Sunday a network of telescopes operated by his team recorded a celestial body approaching the planet.

&quot The asteroid) was discovered on Friday night by our station near Lake Baikal and nine hours later it flew within 11,300 kilometers of the Earth surface, below the orbit of geostationary satellites. It was about 15 meters in size,” he said.

The scientists originally thought that it could be a man-made object, such as a spent rocket booster, but rejected the idea when they couldn’t find a match in the space junk catalogue.

http://en.ria.ru/science/20130930/183845808/Russian-Scientists-Report-Asteroid-Near-Miss.html

[longship]

1. All we need is for one of these NEA's to hit over a major city.

I love Phil Plait's (the Bad Astronomer) TEDx talk about near Earth asteroids.

[jakeXT]

2. Are the Russians nervous after Chelyabinsk ?

The close Earth approach of ~0.04 AU is not noteworthy. Further, the
announcement by the discoverers on The Astronomer's Telegram 5432
(http://www.astronomerstelegram.org/?read=5432) contains orbital elements
that are grossly in error: the close approach distance is some 300 times
larger and the H magnitude seven magnitudes brighter than reported there.

http://www.minorplanetcenter.net/mpec/K13/K13S74.html

[longship]

3. Well, given their crazy pronouncements about Apophis.

Read about at Wiki: 99942 Apophis.

I don't have a lot of faith in Russian science on this matter after what they're saying about Apophis, which not many astronomers are concurring.

[Javaman]

4. I understand that it was "near" and it was a "miss" but wouldn't it be better said as a "near hit"?

nt

[FiveGoodMen]

5. "A collision is a near miss...BLAM!...Look, they nearly missed!"

George was the greatest

[Javaman]

6. LOL! :) nt