Asteroid threat?

[Analog6 (Odille)]

First I've heard of this 'giant asteroid'. Anyone? http://m.couriermail.com.au/technolo...ign=engagement

[Amaranthus (Barry)]

Some more info here:

Asteroid hurtling past Earth at 9pm tonight will be closer than the moon: http://www.independent.co.uk/news/sc...n-9170872.html

Not a threat.

As for observation, unfortunately it is going to be too faint for me in my light-polluted backyard, at 15 mag (I can just squeeze out a confirmed 13.8 to 14.0 on my 8SE in my Bortle 6 skies).

Some details here from iTelescope:
http://www.itelescope.net/sky-alerts...n-5-march.html

[mithrandir (Andrew)]

Originally Posted by Analog6

First I've heard of this 'giant asteroid'. Anyone? http://m.couriermail.com.au/technolo...ign=engagement

Google for SLOOH DX110 and you'll find a link to their video.

[astroron (Ron)]

I am really am sick of this crap reporting
Skimming past Earth
It is nearly 400.000 kms away.
Is the astronomical communitty causing undue alarm by putting out this rubbish.
Are they "Crying wolf" to get funding.

There has probably been a thousand asteroids pass the earth closer than this since the invention of the telescope and the CCD camera.
I take this sort of garbage with a mighty big pinch of salt.
I for one Really Don't give a Damn, if there is one on the way even in the next five years there is Stuff all they can do about it.
Cheers

[FlashDrive (Poppy)]

I thought I felt a ' quick breeze ' go through this morning

[mr bruess]

sensational reporting always makes it to the news.

if it was unexciting there would be no mention of it.

Asteroids do scrape the earth every day but nearly all of them are small.
The earths atmosphere destroys or wipes them out before they hit the ground.

A tunguska like event occurs once every century like the russian meteor of last year in which a ten-ton meteor entered the earth’s atmosphere at 33,000mph, exploding over Chelyabinsk, 900 milles east of Moscow.
The dinosaur killer or busters take millions upon millions of years to show up.

[astroron (Ron)]

Quote)
if it was unexciting there would be no mention of it.

It is NOT exciting it is just made that way by the media posts put out by vested interests trying to raise the profile of NEO's to get funding, IMHO.
Hell I hope that Semi that could hit me, is as far away reletively speaking as this last object is away from the Earth.
The ABC News 24 is a big purvayer of this crass BS, by running a ticker at the bottom of it's news programs, saying things like "Asteroid near miss" and other such crap, without elaborating.
I still think it is Crying Wolf, and I tell people who ask me about that it is all a lot of BS.
Cheers

[redbeard (Damien)]

Originally Posted by FlashDrive

I thought I felt a ' quick breeze ' go through this morning

I felt it too, threw my guiding out

[mithrandir (Andrew)]

2014 EFand 2014 EC passed closer and didn't get the publicity.
Maybe because at close approach they weren't visible from Europe or North America. My calculations in find_orb give:
2014 EF at 2013/03/06.143UTC RA 09:03 Dec-72:46, and
2014 EC at 2013/03/06.888UTC RA 06:29 Dec -62:37

[pdalek (Patrick)]

The NASA Asteroid and Comet Watch site provides a list of future close approaches. Also info on interesting ones.
http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/as...ain/index.html

There is a reasonably close approach, like 2014 DX110, of a rock big enough to hit the ground about every two weeks. The press misses almost all of these, as does the earth.

[AstroJunk (Jonathan)]

Ron you're such a cynic , and of course you are correct in that this originated from a commercial source (SLOOH) to promote a video-cast. I don't personally object to this as Astro news is better than the standard drivel in the press!

I was fortunate enough to have sufficiently clear sky to record both 2014 DX110 and 2014 EC: https://www.youtube.com/user/astroju...iew=46&sort=dd

But both were very faint events and not really newsworthy - at least 2014 EC was very close...