Asteroid to pass within 17,200 miles on 2/15
 

:eek: That's pretty close. :eek:

Asteroid to Give Earth Record-Setting Close Shave on Feb. 15

An asteroid half the size of a football field will give Earth the ultimate close shave this month, passing closer than many satellites when it whizzes by, but it won't hit the planet, NASA scientists say.

The asteroid 2012 DA14 will fly by Earth on Feb. 15 and zip within 17,200 miles (27, 680 kilometers) of the planet during the cosmic close encounter. The asteroid will approach much closer to Earth than the moon, and well inside the paths of navigation and communications satellites.

"This is a record-setting close approach," Don Yeomans, the head of NASA's asteroid-tracking program, said in a statement. "Since regular sky surveys began in the 1990s, we've never seen an object this big get so close to Earth."

More: Asteroid to Give Earth Record-Setting Close Shave on Feb. 15 - Yahoo! News

That's really close. Heck, 250,000 miles would be considered close. I hope something this size hits an ocean during my life time. I would love to see the videos and photography of such an event.

The chance of one that size hitting the earth in our lifetime is pretty good.

Asteroids

It is when you get Asteroid impacts over a mile in diameter that we are seriously effed

Oh, this is a fun little calculator!

Impact: Earth!

The Mayans were off by a smidge...

yer probably right. They calculated it to hit and were off on the margin of error.

It's not a matter of "if".....it's a matter of "when".

We don't know that yet.....

T9

maybe I'll wait to buy that valentines day present for MJ.

i'm gonna get popcorn, whiskey and fireworks.. And order me a couple of strippers...
anything worth doing is worth doing right.

Well, it is Valentines day, anyway...

It would only take the size of a football field sized meteor to impact the earth and make every person on the planet be without tooth paste for a very very very long time.

I hope the triffids don't come to life.

No big deal ...

http://160knots.com/images/Winslow/mc3.JPG

DA14 , if it were to hit, it would "only" be worth the equivalent of 2.5 megatons of TNT

Unless it happens to hit a major city, that's actually not to bad for the rest of the world

No. Please review my above posts.

2012 DA14 has 2.5 megaton (MT) kinetic energy = 1X10^16 joules (J) = 1.3 x 10^8 kg * (1.27 x 10^4 m)^2

If it were 2X as large (diameter), so as to be football field size, it would have 10 MT energy.

About the size of the one of the larger US nuclear weapons.

I think it would be good if it hit the earth, on land somewhere without much intelligent life - Alabama? j/k - and left a warning. That we should develop an effective asteroid deflection system.

Sorry, had to change it, there are some good people in Alabama.

Incredible the building on the crater lip was not affected at all.

If it were to hit the earth, it would wipe out billions of people, but Justin Bieber, Nicki Minaj and New Direction would be among them, so it would be *totally* worth it.

How many parking spaces would that d'bag rock occupy?

any truth to the rumor that the X-37 is being prepped to land some steering nozzles on it so it will hit Iran?

I hope it doesn't hit the moon like in the movie "IMPACT"........that would suck.

Looks like that asteroid may have sent some scouts ahead to thrill some Russians with a little excitement...

This is interesting (and unconfirmed): "According to unconfirmed reports, the meteorite was intercepted by an air defense unit at the Urzhumka settlement near Chelyabinsk. A missile salvo reportedly blew the meteorite to pieces at an altitude of 20 kilometers."

http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1360908835.jpg
http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1360908881.jpg

Video at top of page here:
Meteorite crash in Russia: UFO fears spark panic in the Urals (VIDEO, PHOTOS) — RT

wow
http://rt.com/news/meteorite-crash-urals-chelyabinsk-283/

Watching the local news and there is some cool footage coming in from Russia.

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Meh. Doesn't seem like the news stations here in LA seem to care. Only one of the three big networks has any mention of this on their 11 pm broadcasts. And there's more info on this event on this thread than in that sole news report.

Wait a minute, isn't this how that Armageddon movie started ?!?!

I'll be that Steve Buschemi character from the movie.

<iframe width="560" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/k9YYbrZ4whY" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

Btw, how much time till the Alien virus embedded in the meteoroids take hold and starts the Zombie infestation?

There is no way that they intercepted the asteroid fragments. 11 miles per second...

orbiting sats did it - remember the Reagon error Starwars program? I actually think a few countries were wishing it got in there airspace so that they could blast it. What better way to test the systems and show off for humanity?

If this was the US, Obama would have interrupted Oprah to tell us 'he got the meteorite, he got the meteorite!"

Ha! You beat me to it. Amazing how it just missed that building!

by the time it is at 20 km altitude it would already have slowed down considerably, at 10 KM even more.. reports say it exploded at 10 km.

car sized meteors hit the earth every month or two
 

According to this article, car sized meteors hit the earth every month or two! Perhaps they mean 'earths atmosphere' but still something to wonder.

"Tiny" asteroid causes significant damage in Russia - Astronomy Magazine