Today’s asteroid just missed Earth by a narrow margin

This asteroid just missed Earth. That’s all about it.

The asteroid, named Asteroid 2022 OE2, whizzed past Earth in the early hours of August 4 at 12:23 a.m. (ET).

Although NASA astronomers screen all near-Earth objects (NEOs) for potential danger to Earth, asteroid 2022 OE2 managed to elude them and was discovered just a few days ago. The asteroid passed the Earth at a distance of nearly 5.1 million kilometers.

Near-Earth Objects (NEOs) are monitored by NASA’s Planetary Defense Coordination Office, which monitors the sky with telescopes and monitors upcoming flybys. Tracking these NEOs has become relatively easy as technology advances. With the help of advanced telescopes, more than 750,000 asteroids have been discovered so far, of which more than 27,000 are near-Earth asteroids.

The asteroid was between 557 and 1,246 feet across, which is twice the length of an American football field. It was confirmed to belong to the Apollo asteroid group, which are near-Earth asteroids (NEAs) with perihelion distances less than 1.017 AU and semi-major axis greater than 1 AU.

This isn’t the first time an asteroid has passed close to Earth this year. On May 9, asteroid Asteroid 467460 (2006 JF42) flew close to Earth. Then, on April 28, asteroid 418135 (2008 AG33) passed by our planet. Just a few days ago, an asteroid named Asteroid 2022 OX3 passed close to Earth at 6:45 PM on August 2nd.