Compare exoplanet systems with our solar system, and see artistic renderings of some really weird planets! Eyes on Exoplanets – Visualizations of the thousands of planets that have been discovered orbiting other stars.Eyes on the Earth– View and animate the Earth’s current climate data, see satellites monitoring the Earth, and view important climate events across the globe.I was SO happy when this particular app was released! Eyes on Asteroids– Real-time visualization of the thousands of near-Earth objects, and the 5 asteroids making close-passes.Eyes on the Solar System– Real-time solar system visualization explore hundreds of bodies and spacecraft.The Eyes home page has links to all the apps: This means the apps run cross-platform on smartphones, tablets, desktop PCs – anything with a web-browser and an internet connection. The apps have gone through quite the technological evolution in recent years – originally released as an installable app for Windows and MAC, the Eyes apps now run in a web browser. It is extremely unlikely there could be an impact over the next century by one of these large asteroids, but efforts to discover all asteroids that could pose an impact hazard to Earth continue.NASA’s Eyes apps are a great way to explore our solar system, view the Earth’s climate and explore the thousands of exoplanets that have been discovered. Almost all near-Earth asteroids (about 98%) of the size of 1998 OR2 or larger have already been discovered, tracked and cataloged. Since they are bigger, asteroids of this size reflect much more light than smaller asteroids and are therefore easier to detect with telescopes. On average, we expect asteroids of this size to fly by our planet this close roughly once every five years. That 3-mile-wide (5-kilometer-wide) object zoomed past Earth at 18 lunar distances. The previous close approach by a large asteroid was made by asteroid Florence in September 2017. ![]() This is one of the reasons why tracking this asteroid during its close approach – using telescopes and especially ground-based radar – is important, as observations such as these will enable an even better long-term assessment of the hazard presented by this asteroid.Ĭlose approaches by large asteroids like 1998 OR2 are quite rare. Its next close approach to Earth will occur in 2079, when it will pass by closer - only about four times the lunar distance.ĭespite this, 1998 OR2 is still categorized as a large “potentially hazardous asteroid” because, over the course of millennia, very slight changes in the asteroid’s orbit may cause it to present more of a hazard to Earth than it does now. As a result, we understand its orbital trajectory very precisely, and we can say with confidence that this asteroid poses no possibility of impact for at least the next 200 years. Gianluca Masi (Virtual Telescope Project)Īsteroid 1998 OR2 was discovered by the Near-Earth Asteroid Tracking program at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in July 1998, and for the past two decades astronomers have tracked it. It was about 4.4 million miles (7.08 million kilometers) away from Earth at the time. This GIF, composed of observations by the Virtual Telescope Project, shows asteroid 1998 OR2 (the central dot) as it traversed the constellation Hydra five days before its closest approach to Earth. While this is known as a “close approach” by astronomers, it’s still very far away: The asteroid will get no closer than about 3.9 million miles (6.3 million kilometers), passing more than 16 times farther away than the Moon. The asteroid, called 1998 OR2, was predicted to make its closest approach at 2:55 a.m. ![]() Image credit: NASA/JPL-CaltechĪ large near-Earth asteroid safely passed by our planet on Wednesday morning, providing astronomers with an exceptional opportunity to study the 1.5-mile-wide (2-kilometer-wide) object in great detail.
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