<
https://theconversation.com/astronomers-have-detected-another-planet-killer-asteroid-could-we-miss-one-coming-our-way-193709>
"If you surfed the web this morning, you may have seen news of the latest
existential threat to humanity: a “planet killer” asteroid named 2022 AP7.
Luckily for us 2022 AP7 “has no chance to hit the Earth currently”, according
to Scott Sheppard at the Carnegie Institution for Science. He and his
international team of colleagues observed 2022 AP7 in a trio of “rather large”
asteroids obscured by the Sun’s glare (the other two don’t pose a risk).
2022 AP7 orbits the Sun every five years, and currently crosses Earth’s orbit
when Earth is on the other side of the Sun to it. Eventually its movement will
sync with Earth’s and it will cross much closer by, but this will be centuries
into the future.
We simply don’t know enough about 2022 AP7 to precisely predict the danger it
may pose centuries from now. At the same time, we suspect there could be other
“planet killers” out there yet to be discovered. But how many? And what’s being
done to find them?"
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
