Asteroid 2021 UA1 nearly hit Earth earlier this week; understand

It was Monday (25) when scientists realized that an asteroid had passed close to us and had barely entered our atmosphere. The asteroid appeared, identified as “2021 UA1” 3,047 km above the earth’s surface.

According to information from the Catalina Sky Survey, the small asteroid has a diameter of about two meters, and if it entered our atmosphere, it would not pose any danger to the planet. The asteroid was discovered only about four hours after it approached Earth and was initially recognized by the Minor Planet Center.

Since early 2020, this has been the third asteroid to approach Earth. last year , Asteroids 2020 HQ and 2020 VT4 It approached our planet at a distance of 2,946 km and 374 km from the surface, respectively. According to what was released, the asteroid that approached the planet was traveling at a speed of 57 thousand km / h (15.84 km / s).

The gravity of the planet caused it to deviate significantly. If there was an impact, it would be able to generate energy equivalent to 150 tons of dynamite. The last time an asteroid entered the Earth’s atmosphere and launched a meteorite was in 2013, in Russia, in Chelyabinsk.

The event occurred on February 15 of that year and caused a huge fireball explosion that lit up the sky over Russia. Experts estimate that when entering the Earth’s atmosphere, the meteorite had a mass of 10,000 tons and a diameter of 17 meters (15 more than 2021 AU1), which led to the release of the equivalent 500 tons of TNT quilting of energy during the event.