Ed. Print TRAVEL | The asteroid was baptized with that name by the coincidence with the feast of Ha-lloween. He went on to a slightly greater distance than is the moon and then continued.
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A large meteorite dubbed the “Great Pumpkin “because of its coincidence with the feast of Halloween, reached yesterday at its closest point to Earth, when he approached a just a little further away from the Moon, and then continue its journey through space.
“It’s close, very close! (…) It seems a skull rotating. It’s like the giant head of a white bear, “said astronomer Bob Berman, pointing to the images of stellar rock, relayed by Internet community” Slooh “which has an agreement with the Space Agency (NASA).
“The danger was not even there, it is gone. So in less than a minute, “said the astronomer.
The images broadcast live by the community” Slooh “portrayed a bright and fast space rock, the size of four football fields (400 meters in diameter ) that moved at a speed of 35 kilometers per second, which is a speed 29 times higher than that of a rifle bullet.
Those who could be with a small telescope could see a small bright spot , reflecting the moonlight and was traveling at a high speed.
The space rock, technically called 2015 TB145, was first sighted 21 days ago, on 10 October, telescopes University of Hawaii (USA) and, since then, NASA has monitored the trajectory of celestial object that never was a danger to Earth.
But on the night of witches, step an asteroid so large and so close to Earth has sparked debate in the scientific community, which considers crucial to know the structure of meteorites for how these stellar rocks can be destroyed, if they get too close to Earth.
“The probability that such a large meteorite hit the Earth is one in a million. (..) But, hey, if for example it is directed directly to the city of New York, the city would be completely destroyed. Although it is extremely unlikely, “said astrophysicist Mark Boslough.
Boslough, who works at Sandia National Laboratories in Albuquerque, New Mexico (USA), warned that if the” Great Pumpkin “had reached Earth would have produced a huge crater, destroyed trees and even caused an earthquake of 7.6 degrees on the Richter scale.
“If you hit the ocean could produce a tsunami. We do not know for sure. We are now studying how the energy of a meteorite could be transmitted to the water, “said astrophysicist.
In order to advance the research of these bodies, NASA scientists began Friday to launch waves Radio into the asteroid from the antennas of up to 34 meters long complex Goldstone, Calif.
The radio waves throwing antennas bounce off the asteroid and are collected by two NASA centers, located in West Virginia and Puerto Rico.
The last time he came was in 2006
According to initial calculations of NASA’s “Great Pumpkin” got close to 480,000 kilometers from Earth, equivalent to 1.3 times the distance between our planet from the moon.
last time an object of that size approached Earth was in July 2006, when the asteroid 2004 XP14 was able to approach 1.1 times the distance separating Earth from the Moon, according to the catalog NASA Near-Earth objects.
Until August 2027, the amateur astronomers can not see another asteroid to pass as close as “the Great Pumpkin.”
They will have to wait for 1999 AN10 rock that will come to nearly 384,400 kilometers, the same distance that separates our planet’s lunar satellite, according to NASA. In the coming days, the US space agency will provide images of the spatial phenomenon, shaped like a pumpkin for Halloween magic and continue to delight the curious space many days after it passes through the Earth.
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