An Asteroid Makes a Near-Earth Approach - YU55

We have a special event coming our way, literally. An asteroid by the name of YU55 will speed near Earth on Tuesday 8th, perhaps even becoming visible for those with a good telescope and a clear view to the west. David Perlman's article in the San Francisco Chronicle includes some very helpful information how to find this, as does Kelly Beatty's writeup in Sky and Telescope.

Track of asteroid YU55

This is a fairly rare fly-by of an asteroid. There are 1000s of "Near Earth Objects" (NEOs) being tracked. Tiny objects like meteors are commonplace, impacting Earth daily, and causing no harm as they burn up in the atmosphere. But the NEOs are larger, potentially causing considerably greater harm if they were to collide with Earth. Happily, all NEOs that are being tracked at this time are not on a collision course with us. YU55 will pass quite close by cosmic measures, within the orbit of the Moon. At 1/4 mile in size, an impact by YU55 would cause major damage on Earth, but we need not worry. And the next close fly-by of an asteroid is not expected until 2028, with a similar 'miss by a mile' outcome. Sleep well!