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<ul><li>The Center for Near Earth Object Studies (CNEOS) predicts that a 4 kilometer wide asteroid is going to fly awfully close to the Earth in 2020. </li><li>The asteroid 1998 OR2 could also get pushed into a collision course directly for Earth because of the Yarkovsky effect and gravitational keyholes. </li><li>The massive asteroid could have devastating effects if it were to fall to Earth. </li></ul>An asteroid that stretches for four kilometers, half the of Mount Everest’s height, could be on a collision for Earth in less than a year. National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA)’s Center for Near Earth Object Studies (<a href="https://ssd.jpl.nasa.gov/sbdb.cgi?des=1998%20OR2">CNEOS</a>) estimates that the asteroid, dubbed at 1998 OR2, will be around 6.3 million kilometers from the Earth’s core when it passes by on 29 April 2020. But, there’s a chance that it will be much closer — and even on a <a href="https://www.businessinsider.in/what-is-asteroid-meteorite-and-meteor/articleshow/70654013.cms">direct collision course</a> with Earth — if there’s any nudge to the asteroid’s current trajectory. What can push the asteroid to Earth? There are two main factors in space that can <a href="https://www.businessinsider.in/a-city-killer-asteroid-got-scarily-close-to-earth-yesterday-and-astronomers-didnt-know-about-it-until-it-was-just-days-away/articleshow/70404032.cms">affect the orbit</a> of an asteroid — one, the Yarkovsky effect and two, a gravitational keyhole. And, both, could either push the asteroid closer to Earth or, if one is lucky, further away. The <a href="https://www.businessinsider.in/Astronomers-Are-Planning-Dramatic-Ways-To-Stop-An-Asteroid-Collision/articleshow/21343800.cms">Yarkovsky effect</a>, simply put, is when an asteroid gets pushed around by sunlight. The effect of light hitting an asteroid is minute, but as it happens over a longer period of time — it tends to add up. The shorter the wavelength, the more energy it has and thus the bigger the resulting push. When it comes a gravitational keyhole, on the other hand, the change in an asteroid’s orbit is more immediate. But unlike the Yarkovsky effect, where sunlight is all around, gravitational keyholes only occur in tiny regions of space. If the 1998 OR2 were to pass through a gravitational keyhole — any spot in space where the asteroid’s orbit could get affected by the gravity of a nearby planet — it has the potential to push the asteroid into a direct collision course with Earth. The point of concern is that if the asteroid is to hit Earth, there’s <a href="https://www.businessinsider.in/neil-degrasse-tyson-and-other-scientists-believe-asteroids-will-eventually-hit-earth/articleshow/70644547.cms">very little</a> that anyone can do about it. As of now, most space agencies around the world are still working on their <a href="https://www.businessinsider.in/astronaut-says-a-neglected-telescope-is-nasas-best-chance-of-defending-earth-from-city-killer-asteroids-for-gods-sake-fund-it/articleshow/66910270.cms">planetary defense strategies.</a> See also: <a href="https://www.businessinsider.in/neil-degrasse-tyson-and-other-scientists-believe-asteroids-will-eventually-hit-earth/articleshow/70644547.cms">It might not be 'dinosaur destroying' but it's only a matter of time before an asteroid hits Earth</a> <a href="https://www.businessinsider.in/what-is-asteroid-meteorite-and-meteor/articleshow/70654013.cms">An asteroid only turns into a meteor if it falls to Earth</a> <a href="https://www.businessinsider.in/an-asteroid-was-supposed-to-hit-earth-in-september-but-astronomers-cant-seem-to-find-it/articleshow/70270747.cms">An asteroid was supposed to hit Earth in September — but astronomers can’t seem to find it</a>

An asteroid nearly half the size of Mount Everest might be on a collision course for Earth in less than a year

<ul><li>In a rare event, two asteroids are going to whiz past Earth within hours of each other. </li><li>They’re not the biggest objects on the Asteroid Watch List but they’re two of the closest asteroids to pass by the planet.</li><li>Asteroid 2019 OU1 will be a mere 1 million kilometers from the Earth’s core as it flies past Earth.</li></ul>Asteroids whiz past Earth on a regular basis but it’s rare to see two of them gunning for the planet on the same day. <a href="https://ssd.jpl.nasa.gov/sbdb.cgi?sstr=2019%20QS">2019 QS</a> will be the first asteroid to make an appearance today and it’s around the same size as Christ the Redeemer statue in Rio De Janeiro or the Japan Tsunamis that stretched to 40 meters high. It will be followed by another asteroid dubbed <a href="https://ssd.jpl.nasa.gov/sbdb.cgi?sstr=2019%20OU1">2019 OU1</a>, which is over twice the size of its partner — making it almost as big as a football field at 98 meters. Both of them are going to flying past Earth within a couple of hours of each other. Neither of these two asteroids are as huge some others which are going to fly past the planet this year. But, they’re still on National Aeronautics and Space Administration’s (NASA) <a href="https://cneos.jpl.nasa.gov/ca/">Asteroid Watch List</a> of <keyword id="3106647" type="PERSON" weightage="20" keywordseo="near-earth-objects">Near Earth Objects</keyword> (NEOs) that could pose a risk to the planet. That’s because they’re going to be flying in particularly close. It’s about the distance Most asteroids, regardless of size, are normally at least 3 million kilometers to the Earth’s core as they fly past. But 2019 QS, on the other hand, will come as close as 2 million kilometers. And, 2019 OU1 will be even closer — merely 1 million kilometers away. According to NASA’s Asteroid Watch, any NEO that’s within 7.5 million kilometers of Earth could be ‘potentially hazardous’. When space objects fly this close to the Earth, if external or internal factors were to change their trajectory even to a small degree — they could <a href="https://www.businessinsider.in/a-city-killer-asteroid-got-scarily-close-to-earth-yesterday-and-astronomers-didnt-know-about-it-until-it-was-just-days-away/articleshow/70404032.cms">collide </a>with the planet. The <a href="https://www.businessinsider.in/Astronomers-Are-Planning-Dramatic-Ways-To-Stop-An-Asteroid-Collision/articleshow/21343800.cms">Yarkovsky effect</a>, for instance, is the simple result of sunlight pushing an asteroid and changing the way that it rotates. A gravitational keyhole — gravity from other objects or planets in space — is another factor that could cause asteroids to change direction. The bigger the asteroid, the bigger the risk — like the asteroid that nearly <a href="https://www.businessinsider.in/an-asteroid-nearly-half-the-size-of-mount-everest-might-be-on-a-collision-course-for-earth-in-less-than-a-year/articleshow/70698774.cms">half the size of Mount Everest and might be on a collision course for Earth in less than a year.</a> See also: <a href="https://www.businessinsider.in/what-happens-when-an-asteroid-actually-hits-earth/articleshow/70732006.cms">What happens when an asteroid actually hits Earth</a> <a href="https://www.businessinsider.in/what-is-asteroid-meteorite-and-meteor/articleshow/70654013.cms">An asteroid only turns into a meteor if it falls to Earth</a> <a href="https://www.businessinsider.in/the-last-major-asteroid-to-hit-earth-destroyed-500-square-kilometers-and-it-could-have-been-much-worse/articleshow/70782507.cms">The last major asteroid to hit Earth destroyed 500 square kilometers — and it could have been much worse</a>

Two asteroids bigger than the Japan tsunamis are coming eerily close to Earth today

<div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"><a href="https://www.spacetelescope.org/images/heic1906a/">NASA/ESA/University of Hawaii/European Southern Observatory</a>Asteroid 6478 Gault with two narrow, comet-like tails of debris that suggest the space rock is self-destructing.</div></div></div><ul class="summary-list"><li>A 2.5-mile-wide <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/category/asteroids" target="_blank" rel="noopener">asteroid</a> called 6478 Gault was discovered in 1988.</li><li>The space rock recently grew two long, bright tails like a <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/category/comets" target="_blank" rel="noopener">comet</a>, which astronomers struggled to explain.</li><li><a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/category/hubble-space-telescope" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Hubble telescope</a> observations helped confirm that the asteroid is spinning quickly.</li><li>A sunlight-based effect called "YORP" may have spun up Gault to a speed at which a pebble hitting it would cause it to eject dirt and dust.</li></ul>In space, no one <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/false-space-facts-misconceptions-2017-7">can hear</a> an asteroid scream. But astronomers just used the Hubble telescope to see one begin to destroy itself.A 2.5-mile-wide asteroid called 6478 Gault was first discovered in 1988, and it seemed like many of the other 800,000 known space rocks.But in October 2018, astronomers saw something strange through their telescopes: Gault had become "active" and sprouted two big, bright tails, much <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/oumuamua-interstellar-space-rock-alien-spaceship-evidence-2019-1">like a comet</a>. Its brightest tail stretched more than 500,000 miles long.Some space rocks that initially look like asteroids are later found to be comets when they pass close to the sun. The boost in solar energy can warm up ice and other frozen compounds hidden under layers of dust, turning those materials into gases and leading the rock to spew out comet debris to form a long, glowing tail.Gault didn't seem to fit the bill, though, since it lurks about 214 million miles away from the sun in a fairly circular orbit between <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/mars-outposts-are-doable-but-maybe-not-colonies-2018-5">Mars</a> and <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/jupiter-pictures-nasa-juno-spacecraft-2018-4">Jupiter</a>. In other words, it never swung close to the sun. So scientists wondered if another space rock had collided with Gault, splashing its dusty guts all over space.Now, thanks to multiple observations by NASA and the European Space Agency's Hubble Space Telescope, the mystery appears to be solved: Gault is spinning itself to pieces."This self-destruction event is rare," <a href="https://www.eso.org/~ohainaut/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Olivier Hainaut</a>, an astronomer with the European Southern Observatory, said in <a href="http://hubblesite.org/news_release/news/2019-22" target="_blank" rel="noopener">a press release</a>. "Active and unstable asteroids such as Gault are only now being detected by means of new survey telescopes that scan the entire sky, which means asteroids such as Gault that are misbehaving cannot escape detection any more."Hainaut and his colleagues around the world have submitted <a href="https://iopscience.iop.org/journal/0004-637X" target="_blank" rel="noopener">a study</a> about the discovery to Astrophysical Journal Letters, which accepted it for publication in the future.The team determined an odd behavior called the "YORP effect" is to blame for the ongoing demise of Gault, which could vanish<h2>You YORP me right round</h2>The YORP effect is named after four scientists that helped lead to its discovery: Ivan Yarkovsky, John O'Keefe, Vladimir Radzievskii, and Stephen Paddack.The driver of it is sunlight. When we step outside, light from the sun feels warm on our skin, but not like a force powerful enough to physically move us. But in the vacuum of space, things behave differently, since there's no friction, and objects can orbit a star and persist for millions if not billions of years.Even on human-made objects, like a thin reflective sheet, sunlight can generate enough force to propel a vehicle through space. (Scientists are currently exploring how to mimic that effect by <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/breakthrough-starshot-laser-beam-power-2018-12">shooting powerful laser beams at tiny spacecraft</a> to zoom them toward other star systems at a fraction of <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/how-fast-speed-light-travels-earth-moon-mars-nasa-2019-1">light-speed</a>.)The YORP effect describes a phenomenon in which sunlight hits an asteroid unevenly, or part of the rock's surface preferentially absorbs that energy. In that case, the disparity can gradually accelerate a comet's spin. Over time, that can lead the space rock to start spinning so fast that it rips itself apart.That, the researchers figured, could explain why Gault grew tails so far from the sun (see above animation).Read more: <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/alexandria-ocasio-cortez-asteroid-2018-6">Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez has an asteroid named after her - here's why</a>The effect is something like a parent swinging a kid around by her arms; once the parent rotates fast enough, the kid will eventually lift off the ground. In the case of Gault, Hubble's images - plus follow-up observations by telescopes on Earth - suggested that the asteroid was spinning about once every two hours. The researchers calculated that this was fast enough to counteract Gault's gravity at the surface, allowing dirt and dust to lift off or tumble.But what caused Gault's sudden outburst and tail formation in late 2018, after untold years of inactivity?"Even a tiny disturbance, like a small impact from a pebble, might have triggered the recent outbursts," <a href="https://uhnai.ifa.hawaii.edu/people/postdocs/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Jan Kleyna</a>, an astronomer at the University of Hawaii and the study's lead author, said in <a href="https://www.spacetelescope.org/news/heic1906/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">a press release</a>. "It could have been on the brink of instability for 10 million years."Hainaut said the long-term future of Gault is unknown. It might eventually break apart into two big chunks, or the rubble might glue itself back together under its own gravity, forming a newly shaped asteroid."In all cases, this will release a lot of dust, which will be spectacular," Hainaut told Business Insider in an email. "The radiation pressure from the sun will disperse the dust, leaving either the new Gault or the binary/multiple system behind." <div class="margin-top"> <h3>NOW WATCH: <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/nasa-plans-crash-dart-spacecraft-into-asteroid-2017-7">NASA wants to crash a spacecraft into an asteroid to change its course</a></h3> <div> </div> </div>

The Hubble telescope caught an asteroid ripping itself to pieces due to the 'YORP effect'

<div class="image-container float_right" style="width:400px"><div class="image"></div>Screenshot</div>WORRYING about the threats posed by space rocks has traditionally been the preserve of the paranoid. No one doubts that asteroids have hit Earth in the past, <a href="http://www.universetoday.com/35116/chicxulub-crater/">with</a> <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meteor_Crater">nasty</a> <a href="http://science.nasa.gov/science-news/science-at-nasa/2008/30jun_tunguska/">consequences</a>, but because the chances of any such event happening in a given year <a href="http://www.economist.com/blogs/graphicdetail/2013/02/daily-chart-7">are so low</a>, most people have been content to ignore the risk.
Yesterday, however, a meteorite was seen streaking through the sky above Yekaterinberg in Russia. It hit the ground (possibly landing in a lake) near another city, Chelyablinsk. It is <a href="http://www.nature.com/news/russian-meteor-largest-in-a-century-1.12438">thought</a> to be the biggest meteor to hit Earth in more than a century. The shock wave it caused as it passed overhead blew out windows and injured hundreds of people. Also today, a 50 metre-wide <keyword id="6549794" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="asteroid">asteroid</keyword> called 2012 DA14 is zipping past Earth inside the orbit of some man-made satellites, marking the closest shave on record for an asteroid of that size.
This pair of unrelated events ought to focus minds, and not just among the small group of astronomers who have been worrying about asteroid strikes for many years. The first line of defence, as always, is knowing your enemy. To that end <keyword id="6360409" type="ORGANIZATION" weightage="60" keywordseo="NASA">NASA</keyword>, America's space agency, has been watching the sky since 1998, trying to detect any chunks of rock whose orbits bring them close to Earth. These rocks are known as near-Earth objects (NEOs).
The agency reckons it has now tracked down around 90% of the very biggest NEOs, the "planet killers" a kilometre or more across. (The asteroid that wiped out the dinosaurs is estimated to have been 7-10km across.) These heavyweights account for around 10% of the 10,000 or so known NEOs. Most, like 2012 DA14, are smaller. This makes them less dangerous, though they would still do a lot of damage if they were to hit a town or city. It also makes them harder to spot. This week's events give the various NEO-detection efforts involving NASA, the Japanese Space Agency and several universities around the world a good excuse to ask for more money to expand their search.
Other researchers, meanwhile, have been pondering what to do if an asteroid is detected that is indeed on a collision course with Earth. In the science-fiction film "Armageddon," Bruce Willis leads a team of drillers who blast a dangerous asteroid apart using nuclear weapons, which has the pleasing symmetry of using one doomsday scenario to avert another. But in reality this approach would be problematic. A nuclear explosion might simply fracture a large asteroid into several smaller ones, which could still hit Earth. Legal pedants might also point out that the 1996 Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty bans nuclear explosions in space.
There are other approaches. The European Space Agency is working on a mission called <a href="http://www.esa.int/Our_Activities/Technology/NEO/Don_Quijote_concept">Don Quijote</a> that aims to use a large, heavy spacecraft to ram an asteroid out of the way. Nor is violence the only answer: sending a rocket engine to an asteroid could work if the asteroid in question was relatively small and was detected with plenty of time to spare. Another non-violent proposal is to "paint" one side of an asteroid in light or dark colours, tweaking its trajectory via a neat bit of physics called the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yarkovsky_effect">Yarkovsky effect</a> that describes the way in which sunlight gives celestial bodies a gentle push. Perhaps the most elegant, though least spectacular, solution involves parking a spacecraft called a "gravity tractor" in orbit around an asteroid, and relying on its gravity to tug the rock gently out of the way. 
On February 14th two scientists at the University of California in Santa Barbara outlined another proposal, called DESTAR, in which solar-powered orbiting lasers would be turned on a threatening asteroid. The system could work in one of two ways. The stream of photons pouring from the lasers on a smallish system, roughly the size of the International Space Station, would be able to alter an asteroid's orbit over time by giving it a push. But bigger lasers would provide more destructive options. A large version of the system (roughly 10km across) could, the researchers say, vaporise an asteroid ten times the size of 2012 DA14 over the course of about a year. They claim, perhaps rather optimistically, that their idea is feasible with current technology.
But there is one final point that any aspiring asteroid-hunters would do well to consider. In his 1994 book "Pale Blue Dot", the science writer Carl Sagan pointed out that any technology capable of deflecting an asteroid away from Earth could also be used to place an otherwise unthreatening space rock on a collision course. Supervillains of the world, take note.
Click <a href="http://www.economist.com/products/subscribe/CUR22/noreg">here</a> to subscribe to <keyword id="425741" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="The-Economist">The Economist</keyword>

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An asteroid nearly half the size of Mount Everest might be on a collision course for Earth in less than a year

Prabhjote Gill

Two asteroids bigger than the Japan tsunamis are coming eerily close to Earth today

Prabhjote Gill

The Hubble telescope caught an asteroid ripping itself to pieces due to the 'YORP effect'

Dave Mosher

Astronomers Are Planning Dramatic Ways To Stop An Asteroid Collision

The Economist

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