![]() There is nothing that is big enough to do anything in the near future. This would be bad for a city and for a radius of tens of kilometers around it-bad locally, but not beyond that. It has a diameter of about 250 meters, so could create an impact crater about 2 or 3 kilometers in diameter. It has a one in 250,000 chance of hitting the Earth in 2029 and about one chance in 300,000 of hitting the Earth in 2036 (due to the uncertainty of its orbit). The largest possible threat is from the asteroid 99942 Apophis. ![]() However, unlike the movies, there is nothing very large that is predicted, in the near future, to have any chance of hitting the Earth. But, there are more out there, mostly in the size range that could do in a city. Surveys such as the Catalina Sky Survey are doing a good job of finding most of the larger asteroids, the ones that can cause severe damage. Small asteroids and meteoroids are always coming close to the Earth and sometimes running into the Earth (there are no stop signs or yield signs in space). Are there any asteroids/meteorites headed toward Earth in the next 100 years? Is there a plan? Is 2012 factual time? Five to ten meters is probably the smallest object that would likely survive passage through the Earth’s atmosphere.Ĥ. It is estimated that each day one or two 5–10 meter objects pass within the Moon’s orbit and that there are probably 30 million near-Earth objects! Most of these are too small to ever cause any damage. Also recently, an asteroid about 500 meters in diameter passed about 2 million km from the Earth (five times the distance to the Moon). Most of these are not detected, but recently, three 5–10 meter “asteroids” have been discovered and have passed well within the orbit of the Moon. From a model animation, it appears that lots of small asteroids/large meteoroids pass close to the Earth each day. This is because most fall into the ocean, land in remote areas of the Earth, land in places that are not easily accessible, or are just not seen to fall (fall during the day). It is estimated that probably 500 meteorites reach the surface of the Earth each year, but less than 10 are recovered. To date, there have been nearly 1,100 recovered falls (meteorites seen to fall) and nearly 40,000 finds (found, but not seen to fall).
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