[Keith_McClary]

Quarter-mile-wide asteroid coming close to Earth

This image made from radar data taken in April 2010 by the Arecibo Radar Telescope in Puerto Rico and provided by NASA/Cornell/Arecibo shows asteroid 2005 YU55.
...
The asteroid named 2005 YU55 is being watched by ground antennas as it approaches from the direction of the sun.
...
If 2005 YU55 were to plow into the home planet, it would blast out a crater four miles across and 1,700 feet deep, according to Melosh's calculations. Think a magnitude-7 earthquake and 70-foot-high tsunami waves.
...
Scientists have been tracking the slowly spinning, spherical, dark-colored object since its discovery in 2005, and are positive it won't do any damage.
...
"We're extremely confident, 100 percent confident, that this is not a threat," said the manager of NASA's Near Earth Object Program, Don Yeomans.

[rangerone314]

Be a shame if it crashed into Pakistan.

[Sixstrings]

Yikes that picture is going to send the Nibiru / planet X people running for the hills.

[Novus]

Not really DOOM because they are 100% certain it will not hit the Earth. But I have heard a theory that the YU55 might be weaponized or pulled into the Earth by some type of black project.

[Sixstrings]

Not really DOOM because they are 100% certain it will not hit the Earth. But I have heard a theory that the YU55 might be weaponized or pulled into the Earth by some type of black project.

If it could be nudged (safely) into earth orbit, it would make a fantastic space station platform. Let's hope they don't try.

[Rod_Cloutier]

Here's a video simulation of what would happen to the Earth if an asteroid of this quarter mile size was to hit the Earth:

http://youtu.be/yYgEwXWilUc

[eXpat]

Astronomically speaking, quite close actually



http://ssd.jpl.nasa.gov/sbdb.cgi?sstr=2005%20YU55;orb=1
http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/asteroids/overview/yu55.html
http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/video/index.cfm?id=1030

[JohnRM]

Here's a video simulation of what would happen to the Earth if an asteroid of this quarter mile size was to hit the Earth:

http://youtu.be/yYgEwXWilUc

That WASN'T a quarter-mile sized meteor, in the video. A quarter-mile sized meteor would do significantly less damage.

[kpeavey]

The OP says the image was produced using radar.
If that be the case, there should be at least an outline of the shape of the rock.
There would be no shadow from the sun in a radar image.

Options:
-someone screwed up putting together the html page, wring/bad text or image
-someone changed the image for a better/different image
-The most likely option: proof of Nibiro/Planet X is being hidden from you by the people that run everything. This is from NASA, thats the gubmint, and they are telling you All Is Well. Nov 8-been nice knowin ya.

[Rod_Cloutier]

Interesting co-insidence that this week a movie with the same plot is being released to theatres:

http://www.cinemaclock.com/trailers/man ... holia.html

Where a giant asteriod is unexpectedly on a direct collision course with Earth.

[Keith_McClary]

The OP says the image was produced using radar.
If that be the case, there should be at least an outline of the shape of the rock.
There would be no shadow from the sun in a radar image.

I didn't notice that.

Here:
http://echo.jpl.nasa.gov/~lance/2005CR37/index.html
I find similar "images" with the explanation:
"In each image, range increases from top to bottom and Doppler frequency increases from left to right".

So it's actually a plot of raw radar data, not a telescopic type image.

[Novus]

Here's a video simulation of what would happen to the Earth if an asteroid of this quarter mile size was to hit the Earth:

http://youtu.be/yYgEwXWilUc

The asteroid in the video is a several hundred mile wide planet killer. The impact would be 10,000 times more powerful than the one that killed the Dinosaurs 65 million years ago. In the days before it hit would be brighter than the moon and in the final hour before impact it would grow to be brighter than the Sun. When it did hit the Atmosphere including all the worlds oceans would be vaporized almost instantly killing all life on Earth even down to wiping out all bacteria.

[Laromi]

How terrible, what a disaster, and I should care

[rangerone314]

Oddly, November 9 Wednesday the government is doing their first nationwide test of their alert system.

[eXpat]

This is a link from the NASA
http://solarsystem.nasa.gov/eyes/player/?document=http://solarsystem.nasa.gov/eyes/content/documents/yu55/yu55.xml
You can see here in real time, when the asteroid impacts earth and we can stop worring about Peak Oil

[Keith_McClary]

This is a link from the NASA
http://solarsystem.nasa.gov/eyes/player/?document=http://solarsystem.nasa.gov/eyes/content/documents/yu55/yu55.xml
You can see here in real time, when the asteroid impacts earth and we can stop worring about Peak Oil

These require the "Unity Web Player", not available for Linux, and I would have to get out of my chair to try it on my old Vista laptop.
This may be the same thing?:
First Movie of Asteroid 2005 YU55

Each of the six frames required 20 minutes of data collection by the Goldstone radar. At the time, 2005 YU55 was approximately 860,000 miles (1.38 million kilometers) away from Earth. Resolution is 4 meters per pixel.
"The movie shows the small subset of images obtained at Goldstone on November 7 that have finished processing. By animating a sequence of radar images, we can see more surface detail than is visible otherwise," said radar astronomer Lance Benner, the principal investigator for the 2005 YU55 observations, from NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif. "The animation reveals a number of puzzling structures on the surface that we don't yet understand. To date, we've seen less than one half of the surface, so we expect more surprises."

[SherwinQ]

Many people think that the sky never changes. Not everyone is aware of this matter. A dark asteroid described as "the size of an aircraft carrier" streaked beyond the Earth Tues evening. Passing closer to us than the moon, the large object posed no threat. It did, however, afford experts a unique close-up glimpse at one of these celestial bodies. There has not been a thing as large passing as close to us since 1976. Source for this article: Battleship-sized asteroid buzzes the Earth closer than the moon.

[Serial_Worrier]

Just send Bruce Willis and Liv Tyler, they'll blow it up good.

[Outcast_Searcher]

Many people think that the sky never changes. Not everyone is aware of this matter. A dark asteroid described as "the size of an aircraft carrier" streaked beyond the Earth Tues evening. Passing closer to us than the moon, the large object posed no threat. It did, however, afford experts a unique close-up glimpse at one of these celestial bodies. There has not been a thing as large passing as close to us since 1976. Source for this article: Battleship-sized asteroid buzzes the Earth closer than the moon.

+1
Thank you for a comment with some actual data associated with it.

This kind of thing happens a lot (objects big enough to do real damage pass by relatively closely). (Color in quote from following article, mine).

http://www.newsytype.com/8252-asteroid-shaves-earth/

Near-misses more common than once thought

Asteroids are small objects of minerals and ice which orbit the sun. The larger ones are often called planetoids. The vast majority of asteroids found in our solar system orbit between Jupiter and Mars. At one time, it was believed that passing asteroids were a rare occurrence. However, better detection methods have taught scientists that such incidents are much more common than once thought.

There are nearly 8,100 Near-Earth objects on record. Approximately 1,236 of them have been large enough and close enough to have been classified as Potentially Hazardous Asteroids (PHAs).