Asteroid YU55, Basic Data and possible viewing times 9/9/11

[patrick]

So what makes this event interesting?

• We have never before had advanced knowledge of an object of this big coming this close to the Earth before, this is a new event.
• The approach speed is 14 kilometres per second, or 8 miles per second. Think about that distance and then imagine that being gone by in one second by an object the size of an aircraft carrier.
• The effects of YU55 colliding with a stationary rock in a near space of even soccer ball size could be devastating, having an available kinetic energy equivalent to the detonation of 374 kg of TNT, that could either break up the object or change its direction.
• It is travelling on a very close angle of approach to the Earth and Moon, and the smallest unpredicted change in angle of approach in the right direction would be mean it would be very much closer to the Moon or Earth.

Basic Data

Asteroid Size 400 meters (1300 feet) wide comparable in size to an aircraft carrier approximately spherical Speed of Approach (relative to Earth or Moon) 14 kilometres per second (8 miles per second) NASA predicted Earth approach distance away from Earth 0.85 Lunar distances = 25 Earth diameters away from Earth, 325,000 km, 202,000 mi. NASA predicted Moon approach distance away from Moon 0.62 Lunar distance = 69 Moon diameters away from Moon, 239,000km, 149,000 mi. Date of closest Approach  (most dangerous time) UK: November 8th 23:30h GMT / UTC South Africa: November 9 01:30h Australia: November 9th 10h:30

Debris

I believe the presence of debris and meteor fragments in our space cannot be modelled and cannot be accounted for in a way to say that we would say that no danger exists.

Thanks to

http://www.newegyptevents.com