Small asteroid will pass by Earth today – No danger

Scratched off the Earth today, Thursday 26/1, one will pass asteroid small size, 3.5 to 8.5 meters in diameter. This is one of the closest asteroid approaches ever recorded, at an estimated distance of only 3,600 kilometers from the surface of our planet, according to the American space agency (NASA).

Asteroid 2023 BU will pass just above the southern tip of South America, much lower—by about a tenth—than the orbit of geomodern satellites. However, it does not pose a risk, as even if it did fall to our planet, it would be expected to largely disintegrate upon friction with the Earth’s atmosphere.

The asteroid was discovered last Saturday by amateur astronomer Gennady Borisov from Crimea. Borisov had also discovered the interstellar comet 2I/Borisov in 2019. This was followed by observations of 2023 BU from dozens of other observatories around the world.

The final analysis of its trajectory data was done by the Center for Proximity Studies at Earth of Objects (CNEOS) of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in California. American researchers predicted that the asteroid will pass unusually close to Earth. Yes, because it will come so close, our planet’s gravity will change its courseas a result of which it will in the future erase an oval orbit around the Sun every 425 days, instead of 359 to date.

*Pictures from NASA