Wednesday/ keeping an eye on Apophis 🌠

I stumbled across an old YouTube video in which astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson talks about the dire possibility of giant asteroid Apophis hitting Earth.

Luckily, I also found this updated report on NASA’s web site:
Estimated to be about 1,100 feet (340 meters) across, Apophis quickly gained notoriety as an asteroid that could pose a serious threat to Earth when astronomers predicted that it would come uncomfortably close in 2029. Thanks to additional observations of Apophis, the risk of an impact in 2029 was later ruled out, as was the potential impact risk posed by another close approach in 2036. Until March 2021, however, a small chance of impact in 2068 still remained.

When Apophis made a distant flyby of Earth around March 5, 2021, astronomers took the opportunity to use powerful radar observations to refine the estimate of its orbit around the Sun with extreme precision, enabling them to confidently rule out any impact risk in 2068 and long after.

Source: https://science.nasa.gov/solar-system/asteroids/apophis/

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