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Astronomers Catch Asteroid In Near-Miss Video

Posted by samzenpus on from the skin-of-your-teeth dept.

ananyo writes in with a story about an asteroid near miss and a neat video taken by researchers. "It may look like a blurry blob, but researchers using the InfraRed Telescope Facility (IRTF) in Hawaii have posted a video of 2012 KT42 — a small asteroid that zipped past Earth at a distance of just three Earth radii on 29 May — the sixth closest encounter of any known asteroid. The bright asteroid appears fixed, while background stars zip past but in fact the asteroid is zipping along at 17 kilometres per second. 'You get the view of riding along with it,' says planetary scientist Richard Binzel of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge, who led the observations. At its closest, the asteroid was at a distance between the orbit of the space station (about 1 Earth radii) and geosynchronous satellites (about 6 Earth radii)."

17 of 120 comments (clear)

  1. Space station altitude.... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

    Space station altitude is no where near 1 earth radius!!

    1. Re:Space station altitude.... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

      Ahem... if you're at ground level, your own altitude is 1 earth radius.

    2. Re:Space station altitude.... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Informative

      No, then my altitude is zero as is my distance to the earth.

      Do not confuse altitude with the distance to the center of the earth.

  2. 23 feet, kinda small asteroid by esldude · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I conjured up visions of a small asteroid that might have been a real big event if it collided. I am sure 23 feet in diameter would have made for a heck of a meteorite show. Thread to tremendous death and destruction on earth it isn't however. What is the official lower limit for an asteroid?

  3. 1 Earth radii by TheCreeep · · Score: 5, Informative

    Radius is the single, radii is the plural. When it's only one, we use the singular.
    1 kilometer, 1 liter, 1 metric fuckton. Or as people use across the pond, 1 miles, 1 gallon, 1 imperial fuckton.

    You don't say 1 kilometers, 1 liters and you don't say 1 radii either.
    Hence, it's 1 radius.

    1. Re:1 Earth radii by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

      s/miles/mile

      s/miles/:)
      (looks cute)

  4. Units and news by Thanshin · · Score: 4, Insightful

    the asteroid was at a distance between the orbit of the space station (about 1 Earth radii) and geosynchronous satellites (about 6 Earth radii)."

    How dumb do you have to imagine your audience to create non-standard units on every piece of news?

    Also, with give such an imprecise distance as "between 6353km and 38118km"?

    At least speed came in km/s instead of Sheppeis per Tatum grid.

    1. Re:Units and news by Thanshin · · Score: 4, Informative

      Speaking of which, how much would 17km/s be in Sheppeis per Tatum grid? Good old "units" doesn't know either of those units.

      Sheppey: A measure of distance equal to about 78 of a mile (1.4 km), defined as the closest distance at which sheep remain picturesque.

      Tatum Grid: the lowest regular pulse train that a listener intuitively infers from the timing of perceived musical events.

    2. Re:Units and news by Platinumrat · · Score: 4, Funny

      In New Zealand, the Sheppey is about 0.5m

    3. Re:Units and news by danhuby · · Score: 4, Insightful

      On the contrary, Earth radii is a useful unit when explaining how close something came to the earth. It helps to form a mental picture.

      For example, if you state that the moon is 384,400km from the earth, that doesn't really mean much - even if you know the diameter of the earth it's not as easy to form a mental picture as it is if you say that it is 62 Earth radii.

      Personally though I would have thought diameters would be better than radii? I.e. the moon is 31 Earth diameters (or simply 31 'Earths') away. (As a side note I think that is much further than most people would guess it is).

    4. Re:Units and news by Muad'Dave · · Score: 4, Informative

      Many sites that report on PHAs (Potentially Hazardous Asteroids) use LD, meaning Lunar Distance. That's pretty descriptive to the general public - "Wow that thing flew right between Earth and the Moon!". According to their archive, KT42 missed Earth by 0.05 LD and was #6 on the all-time closest flyby list.

      --
      Tiller's Rule: Never use a word in written form that you've only heard and never read. You will end up looking foolish.
    5. Re:Units and news by cyberchondriac · · Score: 4, Funny

      I know, let's ask Rebecca Black!

      --

      Look back up at my post, now look back down, you're on the Internet. Now look back up. I'm a signature.
  5. Downloadable video by k(wi)r(kipedia) · · Score: 5, Informative
    I can't view anything in my Flash-free browser. After some searching I found what looks like a downloadable video of the asteroid flyby (56 MB). From the caption:

    The sixth closest asteroid encounter on record, the May 29 near-miss by the object catalogued as "2012 KT42", was tracked by the NASA Infrared Telescope Facility (IRTF) on Mauna Kea, Hawaii as it whizzed inside the orbital distance of Earth geosynchronous satellites (6.6 Earth radii or an altitude of 22,000 miles).

  6. Near Miss by erktrek · · Score: 5, Funny

    Here's a phrase that apparently the airlines simply made up: near miss. They say that if 2 planes almost collide, it's a near miss. Bullshit, my friend. It's a near hit! A collision is a near miss.
    [WHAM! CRUNCH!]
    "Look, they nearly missed!"
    "Yes, but not quite.”

    George Carlin

  7. Re:Near miss? Near hit, rather.... by CompComp · · Score: 5, Insightful

    The asteroid missed. It didn't miss by by a large amount- it came near. It was a near miss. It didn't hit, so it wasn't a "near hit" or a "far hit".

  8. At ground level your altitude is zero. by Herve5 · · Score: 5, Informative

    And the space station is some *20 times* closer to Earth than an earth radius. I must say I stopped reading here too.

    --
    Herve S.
  9. No it is not. by Kupfernigk · · Score: 4, Funny
    In Latin "Prius" is not a noun, and so radius/radii does not apply. Normal rules of English mean the plural of Prius the vehicle is Priuses. (And the plural of octopus is similarly octopuses; it is not a Latin word but the Greek "oktopous", and its Greek plural is oktopodes.)

    As the Latin tag says, "Quem deus vult perdere, dementat prius" (those whom the Gods wish to destroy, they send mad thinking about the plural of Prius".

    --
    From scarped cliff or quarried stone she cries "A thousand types are gone, I care for nothing, no not one."