If you watched “Don’t look up” on Netflix, this excellent film with Leonardo DiCaprio and Jennifer Lawrence, the following should remind you of something…
Indeed, as in Adam McKay’s film, a giant asteroid will graze our planet on Tuesday, reports Sky News, quoting the American space agency NASA. The asteroid, discovered in 1994 and baptized “1994 PC1”, is more than a kilometer high and evolves at the dizzying speed of 20 km per second!
But unlike the film, the earth will not explode. Phew! According to NASA, the event will not represent any danger. And the asteroid that will graze the earth is “known and studied for years”, reassures NASA. Good news: so we’re not all going to die on Tuesday because “grazing”, in the lexicon of scientists from the American space agency, does not have exactly the same meaning as in everyday life. The celestial object will pass more than 1.9 million kilometers from Earth. The next time this asteroid will be so close to the earth, it will be in 2105. So nothing to fear.
Gilles Robert, head of the Observation Center Ardenne, smiles at this news released by NASA. “Grinding doesn’t mean a whole lot. The asteroid will still pass very far from the earth. Afterwards, it is true that the size of this asteroid is impressive because it is much larger than a normal near-Earth asteroid, that is to say an asteroid whose orbit crosses that of the Earth. And it is true that if an asteroid of this size were to hit the earth, it would cause damage. No risk either that this asteroid strikes satellites, which are ultimately quite close to the earth and which are not likely to be affected.
To observe 1994 PC1, you will need a very good telescope of at least 15 cm in diameter and be on the alert between 9 p.m. and 11 p.m. The asteroid will not be visible to the naked eye.
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