Showing posts with label close-approach. Show all posts
Showing posts with label close-approach. Show all posts

10 June 2016

2016 LP10 made a close approach to Earth 09JUN2016.

2016 LP10 made a close approach to Earth 09JUN2016.

 Newly-announced NEO 2016 LP10 made a very close approach at a distance of 0.0004AU / 0.19LD / 40,657 miles (nominal) from Earth's surface at 18:32Z yesterday (Thu-09-Jun-2016) - traveling at a relative velocity of 35,798 mph.  2016 LP10 is estimated to have a diameter of 3m-7m.

The Apollo-class 2016 LP10 was first observed on June 8th 2016, however according to JPL data, it also made a previous close-approach on June 8 2013 at 9.12PM at a nominal distance of 1,491,579 miles (min. distance 1,986 miles) from Earth's surface.  Also, according to JPL data, its Earth MOID (Minimum Orbit Intersection Distance) is listed at 8.53E-6 miles = -3,171 miles.

2016 LP10 found its way on to JPL's 'all-time closest 100 asteroids' table at position #44 and demoted 2014 AG51 to position #101.  (2014 AG51 made its close-approach in 2014).

2016 The THIRD Year of "CERTAIN Uncertainty" ™ / Meteors, Asteroids, Comets, and MORE!!

18 March 2016

New asteroid discovery 2016 EF195: 15,000 miles from Earth's surface

reported by  meteordetective

Things seem to be picking-up rapidly!

NASA NEOP has just posted details of asteroid 2016 EF195 which made its close-approach at just 15,558 miles from Earth's surface on 11-Mar-2016 at 03Z52.

2016 EF195 is estimated to be 20m - 50m in diameter (based on magnitude) and travelling at 10km/s  or 6.25 mi/s.  It's close-approach brought it beneath geo-stationary satellite altitude of ~22,236 miles.  It was not detected until 4 days after its close-approach.

It is the 4,881st asteroid (within 0.5 AU) to be discovered in the first two weeks of March 2016 (NASA period "E") and the 34th asteroid discovery of 2016 period "E" to approach within 10LD or less.

2016 EF195 is the 2nd asteroid within a month (the other was 2016 DY30) to make its close-approach below geo-stationary satellite altitude.

Keep your cameras ready and your eyes on the skies (when it's safe to do so).

2016 The THIRD Year of "CERTAIN Uncertainty" ™ / Meteors, Asteroids, Comets, and MORE!!

11 March 2016

321P/SOHO makes its close-approach on 13-Mar-2016

321P/SOHO makes its close-approach on 13-Mar-2016
reported by  meteordetective

A reminder for astronomers and astronomy enthusiasts:

Jupiter-family Comet 321P/SOHO makes its close-approach to Earth on Sunday 13-Mar-2016 at 05Z21 - at a distance of 62.38LD = 0.16028 AU = 14.9 million miles from Earth.

The Comet is currently located in the constellation of Ophiuchus at 17h35m40.32s +05°07'09.6" - and is rapidly tracking 'West' (increasing its Right Ascension value) on its way to closest-approach.

At the precise time of its closest-approach to Earth, it will be located in the constellation Aquila at 19h20m08.58s +10°45'25.3" at 05Z21.  It should be +/- Magnitude 15.

Click image to enlarge screenshot (created using Stellarium).



2016 The THIRD Year of "CERTAIN Uncertainty" ™ / Meteors, Asteroids, Comets, and MORE!!

08 March 2016

New asteroid made close-approach less than 5,000 miles from Earth's surface

New asteroid made close-approach less than 5,000 miles from Earth's surface
reported by  meteordetective

NASA have published data of a very close-approach which occurred on Feb-25 at 19:49Z (note that the asteroid was not discovered until the following day).

The asteroid in question is 2016 DY30 (the 774th <0.5 AU asteroid to be discovered since March 01 2016).

Its nominal (expected) close-approach distance was just 4933.546 miles from Earth's surface.  Although small (estimated to be 2-5m in diameter), it was travelling at just over 17km/s (relative to Earth) at the time of its close-approach.

2016 DY30 entered NASA's all-time close-approaches table at position #5.  It is the 6th asteroid, this year, which has found its way on to the 'top 100' table. There were 13 new entries in this 'top 100' table last year (2015) and 12 entries during 2014.

8 asteroids have made / will make their close-approach of less than 1LD (average distance from Earth to the Moon) during the current +/- 30 days period.  2016 DY30 was the only one of these which was (well) below geo-stationary altitude of 22,236 miles.

Watch the skies...

2016 The THIRD Year of "CERTAIN Uncertainty" ™ / Meteors, Asteroids, Comets, and MORE!!

28 February 2016

Asteroid news: NASA's update on 2013 TX68

Asteroid news: NASA's update on 2013 TX68
reported by  meteordetective
Link to article which was updated on Thu 25-Feb-2016 at 14:40 Pacific Time (22:40Z) and was originally posted on Tue 02-Feb-2016.

NASA have refined their "earlier flyby and distance predictions, reconfirming that the asteroid poses no threat to Earth."

But, the 'plot' thickens, as NASA has additionally "..identified an extremely remote chance that this small asteroid could impact on Sep. 28, 2017, with odds of no more than 1-in-250-million. Flybys in 2046 and 2097 have an even lower probability of impact."

I thought I'd investigate further and used Telnet to 'talk' to JPL's "Horizons" system.  However, as you can see (from the copy/paste below), there is no close-approach listed for 2017.  To be clear and specific, I instructed Horizons to show me all the known approaches from 01-Jan-2000 to 01-Jan-2200.

        Date (TDB)      Body   CA Dist  MinDist  MaxDist   Vrel  TCA3Sg  Nsigs  P_i/p
----------------------  -----  -------  -------  -------  ------ ------ ------ -------
A.D. 2001 Feb 12.30797  Venus  .075550  .029997  .430225  10.352 95321. 27737. .000000
A.D. 2013 Oct 13.34047  Earth  .013900  .013840  .013959  14.066   0.34 505.63 .000000
A.D. 2016 Mar 08.00436  Earth  .033383  .000207  .115301  15.324 8719.4 463.31 .000000
A.D. 2024 May 21.93046  Mars   .051950  .039661  .181328  15.950 8218.6 83319. .000000
A.D. 2028 Oct 22.29797  Earth  .092654  .010847  .254975  11.643 36290. 37681. .000000

If you access the asteroid's entry in JPL's SBDB, you'll see the following Close-Approach dates & times listed, which barely correspond to the Telnet session results (above).

2016-Mar-08 00:06, 2056-Sep-18 13:29, 2071-Sep-30 14:02, 2074-Feb-17 05:44, 2084-Oct-20 19:33, 2086-Oct-16 07:11, 2089-Feb-07 09:03, 2089-Mar-14 21:35.

Is something out of sync?

I'd initially intended to comment on the wide variance of 2013 TX68's potential close-approach distances (all relative to Earth's surface), which are remarkable and summarised below:

Nominal (the expected or 'should be' distance): 13.06 LD = 3,099,296.455 miles
Minimum: 0.08LD = 15,282.762 miles
Maxium: 45.09LD = 10,714,428.346 miles

(For reference, 1 LD --aka 1 Lunar Distance-- is equivalent to 382,500 kilometers / 239,062.5 miles (NASA)).

The difference between minimum and maximum values is 7,615,132 miles or 8.19% of the distance from Earth to the Sun...or also equivalent to 3,185.42% the distance from Earth to the Moon....which is a rather large value.

To add a further variable in to this situation, MPC have assigned 2013 TX68 a condition code of 8 for  its orbit uncertainty (10=highly uncertain and 0 = "good"), which is due to the fact that 2013 TX68 was only tracked for 3 days when it was initially discovered/observed - before it was 'lost' again.

Let me make myself perfectly clear:  I'm not suggesting 2013 TX68 will hit Earth, inferring it or stirring-up 'fear-porn'.  I'm just a little perplexed by the apparent of confusion --regarding when it will make its close-approaches to Earth-- and mentioning that there's a very wide margin of 'error' between the distances NASA are reporting for its 08-March-2016 close-approach.

Stay tuned!

Write to:
meteordetective AT gmail DOT com.

2016 The THIRD Year of "CERTAIN Uncertainty" ™ / Meteors, Asteroids, Comets, and MORE!!

20 February 2016

Two Comets to make record close-approach during March 2016

Two Comets to make record close-approach during March 2016
reported by meteordetective
Click-on image to enlarge | Credit: Nemesis Maturity 2016
Two comets headed for close approaches to Earth record-breaking comet flyby in March 2016.
March turns out to be the month of great celestial events in 2016. On March 21 the comet 252P/LINEAR 12 will make its closest approach yet, passing just 3.1 million miles (5.3 million km) Comet P/2016 BA14 (PANSTARRS) is set to pass by Earth at a distance of 2.1 million miles (3.5 million km). This is a record-breaking approach to Earth for a comet!!! Comet's P/2016 BA14 (PANSTARRS) passage will be the closest known comet flyby of the last 230 hundred years. Comet P/2016 BA14 (PANSTARRS) was discovered by the Pan-STARRS survey on 2016 Jan 22

"Twin" Comets Headed for close approaches to Earth Record-Breaking Comet Flyby March 2016
Posted to Youtube by: nemesis maturity 2,624 views

2016 The THIRD Year of "CERTAIN Uncertainty" ™ / Meteors, Asteroids, Comets, and MORE!!