City block-sized asteroid marks closest approach to Earth

PanARMENIAN.Net - An asteroid the size of a city block zoomed inside the moon's orbit on Tuesday, November 8, in a rare flyby that marked the closest approach to Earth by such a big space rock in 35 years.

The asteroid 2005 YU55 came within 201,700 miles (324,600 kilometers) of Earth at 6:28 p.m. EST (2328 GMT) Tuesday evening before speeding off into deep space once again at about 29,000 mph (46,700 kph).

The space rock is about 1,300 feet (400 meters) wide. An asteroid this large hasn't come so near to Earth since 1976 and won't again until 2028, researchers said.

The asteroid encounter brought 2005 YU55 closer than the moon, which orbits Earth at an average distance of 238,864 miles (384,499 km). But there was never any danger that 2005 YU55 would slam into Earth. . Scientists eagerly awaited the close encounter all the same, since it's providing an unprecedented opportunity to learn more about the asteroid and its orbit.

NASA has already released a new image of 2005 YU55 taken by the big Goldstone antenna, with many more surely on the way. And several organizations, including the Clay Center Observatory in Massachusetts and the online telescope service Slooh, provided live webcasts of the space rock's close flyby, the Christian Science Monitor reported.