Another near miss asteroid

[TheThorn]

You'll probably be reading about this elsewhere soon, but I'm not aware of ay links currently to this story.

An asteroid, temproarily designated AT72198, was discovered late this afternoon. With 5 observations, the MPC (Minor Planet Centre) has calculated a preliminary orbt that brings it within 100,000 miles of the earth tomorrow. Collision has already been ruled out. I have not seen an estimate of size. It is moving quite fast, so the amateurs who usually follow up this sort of discovery have their hands full trying to re-find it.

Here's a copy of a post on the minor planet mailing list from a member of the MPC:

"Nice object... 5 positions, very bright. Good fit bringing
the object to about 0.0009 AU in 15+ hours from now. Will
be interesting to see how good this prediction is. I was
fairly careful with the uncertainty map. Impact is ruled out
already...

Tim
MPC
(NOT OUT TO DINNER THIS TIME&#33"

[piersdad]

:blink: Yikes im off to the underground bunker just in case

[astromark]

:blink: No, not going to hid in a hole. I would sagest a hill top some where so as to see all the fire works. . . .
we have a 100% cloud cover. Im going to feel or hear this thing. maybe.lets hope not a. . .

[suntrack2]

sometime we miss to look.

[Fraser]

D'oh, write me an email next time you learn about this kind of thing, I'd have done a story. I guess I should check my forum more often. :-)

[withaGee]

WOW! "0.0009 AU"? I'd call that a near hit given that in the past visitors coming within a million miles or so were deemed "close." A distance comparable to a third of the way to the Moon seems a bit close. -And nothing yet in the news?

(Comments welcomed as to why this approaching object is not so unusual - I've missed a lot of news in my time.)

-G

[piersdad]

I guess the blighter has used the old war tactic of comming at us from the sun and sneaking up on our tail

[buzzlightbeer]

Originally posted by fraser@Mar 18 2005, 05:48 PM
D'oh, write me an email next time you learn about this kind of thing, I'd have done a story. I guess I should check my forum more often. :-)

why is it still too late to do a story?

[damienpaul]

holy odd socks! thats close. Fraser, you could still do a story on this

[vet]

"Casandra" here---'I told ya so.' to 'abstract an old Sky & tel article (they do sell reprints)---the sun may orbit through areas of varied debris'.---i doubt any argument here---so i'm a self-merchandiser? who isn't---of 'human nature'?

this is a critical area for 'amateurs'---one more time---take a search on 'earth impact database' get a free 'hair-on-end' do---you don't get out, you're dead meat---so kill another messenger. call it aggressive copy---the way humanity has 'flooped' around after lunar landing, it seems in need of a 'drill seargent's' impolite attitude.

there are probably hundreds, if not thousands of amateur observatories and 'portable observers'---some comet hunters, highly-skilled at catching 'sun-grazing' comets---

seems time, perhaps it's already been done---time for a concerted effort. kind of a 'SETI' program---but life-sustaining---has this been done??????????

[TheThorn]

Yes, vet, there are afforts to find and catalog all potentially hazardous asteroids over 1 km diameter. That's why we're hearing about ones like this one. They get caught in the same net.

There are now hundreds of observations of this one, and they've given it an official designation - 2005 FN. All the observations can be found here if you have any idea how to interpret them.

It's estimated to be 17 meters in diameter, and came closest to earth a couple of hours ago (March 18.9 UTC). The original estimated closest approach was very good.

I still haven't seen any press coverage, and a google on 2005 FN turned up nothing. But there's a lot of buzz on the MPML. And there is some info on it at Nasa's NEOP page. and A/CC has been covering it.

So that swishing sound you heard at about 4:30 EST was just a near miss. If it had hit, something this size would probably just shattered in the atmosphere. It would have been a lot less serious than the tsunami, for instance.

[TheThorn]

And, Sorry, Fraser. Next time (if there is one) I'll send you a note.

[zephyr46]

Wow! Close or what!

Thats the sort of rock it would be great to stick a camera on!

On a side issue, I had a look at the Orbit Veiwer credits on NASAs NEO program page, and found out it was freely available for use from AstroArts.

I don't know if the invasion board software would allow it, but orbit veiwer would be a nice addition to Unverse Today for such stories.

[TheThorn]

They've scheduled radar observations of 2005 FN at the Arecibo observatory.

Here's another nice link from A/CC.