NASA has warned that an asteroid the size of an airplane is headed for Earth on September 11. Will it crash? Here’s what NASA has to say.
NASA’s Artemis 1 mission is dominating the headlines these days. The Artemis program was NASA’s first attempt to send a manned mission to Moon since the Apollo mission in 1972. According to NASA, Artemis I will be the first test flight of Space Launch of the System rocket and Orion spacecraft. Amidst all the news regarding the Artemis 1 mission, NASA has also released a small planet warning.
The space agency has warned that an asteroid, named Asteroid 2022 RE is on its way The earth and is expected to miss the planet on September 11. The asteroid is the size of an airplane at nearly 68 feet wide. It is traveling at an amazing speed of 44,064 kilometers per hour. Asteroid 2022 RE will make its closest approach to Earth on September 11 at a distance of only 2.29 million km.
We’re only a week into September and we’ve already seen almost a dozen small planet pass close to the Earth. Asteroid 2022 RE belongs to the Apollo asteroid group. According to the-sky.org, the distance of asteroid 2022 RE from Earth is currently 4.07 million km, or 0.03 astronomical units. The asteroid completes one orbit around the Sun in 992 days.
More information on the Artemis 1 quest
The Artemis 1 mission is scheduled to launch with the help of NASA’s new Space Launch System on August 29 at the Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Florida. However, this launch was scrapped due to a malfunction in one of the SLS’s RS-25 engines. The launch was rescheduled for September 3, but it was removed again due to a hydrogen tank leak. The current, NASA decided to replace the seal on the rocket. As a result, the mission launch is likely to be delayed by at least a month.
