The asteroid is marked by an arrow at the center of this image, taken October 27, 2019 via the Virtual Telescope Project.
On October 29, 2019, the near-Earth asteroid 2019 UB8 will have a safe, very close encounter with our planet, coming at about 120,000 miles (190.000 km) from us, half of the average distance of the moon. We at the Virtual Telescope Project in Rome managed to capture it and we will show it live around its fly-by time on October 29, 2019!
The image above comes from the average of three 500-second exposures, remotely taken with “Elena” (PlaneWave 17?+Paramount ME+SBIG STL-6303E) robotic unit available at Virtual Telescope. The telescope tracked the apparent motion of the asteroid. This is why stars show as small trails, while the asteroid looks like a faint, sharp dot of light in the center of the image, marked by an arrow.
The image above is quite exceptional, considering how faint (being small, see below) and fast-moving this rock is.
At the imaging time, asteroid 2019 UB8 was at about 1.3 million km (808,000 mi) from the Earth and it was on its way, approaching us.
This 4.3-9.5 meter (14 to 31 foot) large asteroid will reach its minimum distance (120,000 miles or 190.000 km) from us on October 29, 2019, at 06:30 UTC. Of course, there are no risks at all for our planet.
We are scheduling a live feed on October 29, 2019, starting at 00:30 UTC to track it live: more soon!
Bottom line: A small asteroid – 2019 UB8 – will come very close to Earth on October 29, 2019. It’ll sweep safely past at about half the moon’s distance. Details here.
EarthSky 2020 lunar calendars are available! They make great gifts. Order now. Going fast!
from EarthSky https://ift.tt/2p92RNV
The asteroid is marked by an arrow at the center of this image, taken October 27, 2019 via the Virtual Telescope Project.
On October 29, 2019, the near-Earth asteroid 2019 UB8 will have a safe, very close encounter with our planet, coming at about 120,000 miles (190.000 km) from us, half of the average distance of the moon. We at the Virtual Telescope Project in Rome managed to capture it and we will show it live around its fly-by time on October 29, 2019!
The image above comes from the average of three 500-second exposures, remotely taken with “Elena” (PlaneWave 17?+Paramount ME+SBIG STL-6303E) robotic unit available at Virtual Telescope. The telescope tracked the apparent motion of the asteroid. This is why stars show as small trails, while the asteroid looks like a faint, sharp dot of light in the center of the image, marked by an arrow.
The image above is quite exceptional, considering how faint (being small, see below) and fast-moving this rock is.
At the imaging time, asteroid 2019 UB8 was at about 1.3 million km (808,000 mi) from the Earth and it was on its way, approaching us.
This 4.3-9.5 meter (14 to 31 foot) large asteroid will reach its minimum distance (120,000 miles or 190.000 km) from us on October 29, 2019, at 06:30 UTC. Of course, there are no risks at all for our planet.
We are scheduling a live feed on October 29, 2019, starting at 00:30 UTC to track it live: more soon!
Bottom line: A small asteroid – 2019 UB8 – will come very close to Earth on October 29, 2019. It’ll sweep safely past at about half the moon’s distance. Details here.
EarthSky 2020 lunar calendars are available! They make great gifts. Order now. Going fast!
from EarthSky https://ift.tt/2p92RNV
Aucun commentaire:
Enregistrer un commentaire