obama's fault
The space rock will come within 17,000 miles of Earth, which is closer than some of our satellites, but Plait says this is nothing to worry about.
He adds: ‘Seventeen thousand miles is well beneath many of our own orbiting satellites. To the best of my knowledge, this is the closest pass of a decent-sized asteroid ever seen before the actual pass itself. However, let’s again be very clear - it will miss. In astronomical terms, 17,000 miles is pretty close, but in real human terms it’s a clean miss.’
After next year, 2012 DA14’s closest brush with Earth will come in 2020, but Plait said that even then the odds of an impact will be less than the chance of being hit by lightning in your lifetime – 1 in 100,000.
Last night a space rock caused panic across the UK, with police forces inundates with calls after spotting it in the sky and mistaking it for a burning aircraft.
Police forces across the UK were inundated with calls last night after a large fireball, thought to be a meteor, was spotted in the sky.
Reports of a 'bright light' and an 'orange glow' were received by police across Scotland and the north of England at about 9.40pm yesterday.
The Met Office tweeted: 'Hi all, for anyone seeing something in the night sky, we believe it was a meteorite.'
The Kielder Observatory also reported the sighting of a 'huge fireball' travelling from north to south over Northumberland.
The Observatory posted on Twitter: 'Of 30 years observing the sky, fireball best thing I have ever seen period.'
Read more:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2110396/Asteroid-2012-DA14-NOT-hit-Earth-year-says-astronomer.html#ixzz1oIbT88WS
