NANJING, Jan. 18, 2022 (Xinhua) The Purple Mountain Observatory of the Chinese Academy of Sciences said Monday that an asteroid the size of half a football field is expected to pass close to Earth next month, without posing a threat to the planet.
The asteroid was first observed by the observatory on January 1, and the Small Planets Center of the International Astronomical Union confirmed the discovery of the asteroid and named it “2022 AA”, which means that it is the first near-Earth asteroid to be discovered this year. Since then, he has been closely watched by monitoring stations in the United States and Chile as well.
The newly discovered object, estimated to be 43 meters wide, belongs to the Apollo group of asteroids. The orbits of these asteroids are larger than the Earth’s orbit around the Sun, and their paths intersect with the Earth’s orbit.
The Chinese observatory expects the asteroid to fly near Earth on February 4.
The asteroid is heading toward Earth and is expected to approach the Earth’s surface at a distance of 2.55 million km, said Zhao Haibin, chief scientist of the observatory’s Near-Earth Object Telescope Program.
“Given this distance, the asteroid will not pose a threat to Earth,” Zhao added.
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