In a recent report released by the United States space agency NASA, the God of Chaos asteroid whose real name is “Asteroid Apophis” which is named after the ancient Egyptian god of chaos and darkness is likely to hit the earth after Hundred years.
Earth After 100 Years
Asteroid Apophis was discovered in the year 2004 and was declared one of the asteroids that posed the greatest threat to Earth by NASA. It measures 340 meters big.
NASA predicted the Asteroid Apophis will come very close to the earth and this thing to happen is expected in the years 2029 and 2036. But was ruled out later by NASA.
However, a possibility of a collision in the year 2068 is still there.
Apophis’ motion was tracked by astronomers with the help of a 70-meter radio telescope located at the Deep Space Network’s Goldstone in California.
Another telescope named the 100-meter Green Bank Telescope which is located in West Virginia showed imaging of Apophis was also used by them.
As stated by NASA, if the large asteroid approaches Earth again in the year 2029, at that time it is expected to come as near as 32,000 km only which is almost one-tenth of the distance between the Earth and the Moon.
It will be clearly visible in the sky in Asia, Africa, and some parts of Europe, without using binoculars or telescopes.
Classification of Asteroids
- The first category of asteroids is found in the Asteroid belt which lies between Mars and Jupiter planets.
- The second category of asteroids is trojans, which includes those asteroids that share an orbit with a larger planet.
- The third category of asteroids includes Near-Earth Asteroids, which have orbits that pass very close to the Earth.
Any asteroids crossing the orbit of the Earth are called Earth-crossers.
To date, more than 10,000 asteroids have been identified, over 1400 of them as potentially hazardous asteroids.
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