NASA said an asteroid the size of an airliner will pass close to Earth on Tuesday.
The 200-foot asteroid, dubbed 2023 JD2, will pass within 3.5 million miles of Earth, a relatively close distance in terms of space, NASA’s Asteroid Watch reported. The agency marks objects bigger than 150 feet that pass within 4.6 million miles of Earth as potentially hazardous objects.
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Despite this, there is little to no danger of the asteroid hitting Earth save for an unforeseen force knocking it off course.
A smaller 46-foot asteroid, around the size of a house, is set to make a near pass by Earth the same day. Though smaller, 2023 JO1 is estimated to pass within 1.86 million miles of Earth.
The two meet the classification of near-Earth objects, which NASA defines as “comets and asteroids that have been nudged by the gravitational attraction of nearby planets into orbits that allow them to enter the Earth’s neighborhood.”
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2023 JD2 is somewhat similar to 2023 DZ2, an asteroid estimated to be between 140 feet and 310 feet long, which passed close by Earth in June. It was found to be large enough to take out an entire city, earning it the distinction of “city killer.”
Asteroids are relatively small and inactive, orbiting the sun typically inside the asteroid belt, which lies between Mars and Jupiter. Occasionally, asteroids will take an orbit that takes them deep inside the solar system, putting them on a possible collision course with Earth. They are composed of rock, dust, or metallic materials.
