Asteroid 2010 WC9 To Pass Between Earth And Moon Tomorrow

An asteroid called 2010 WC9 will safety make a very close flyby of the Earth tomorrow. This isn't a particularly large Asteroid, it measures 197 to 427-feet. The big news here is that this will be one of the closest approaches ever observed of an asteroid this size.

One interesting tidbit about this asteroid is that it was first observed on November 30, 2010, and was watched until December 10 of the same year before it became too dim to see and was lost. On May 8, 2018, an asteroid was spied and given the name Zj99C60 until scientists realized this was the return of Asteroid 2010 WC9.

The closest approach will happen May 15 at 6:05 pm RDT. That closest approach will put it 0.53 lunar distances from Earth, or about 126,419 miles from Earth. NASA says that this will be the closest approach of this asteroid in almost 300 years.

While the asteroid isn't particularly large, it is said to be larger than the Chelyabinsk asteroid that entered the Earth's atmosphere and broke windows in six Russian cities. That meteor was estimated to be only about 65-feet in diameter before entering our atmosphere.

That shows even small meteors have the potential to cause damage and injure people on the ground. Asteroid 2010 WC9 will be traveling 28,655 miles per hour when it passes by.

SOURCE: Earthsky.org