Mars Asteroid - The NASA Near-Earth Object Program is reporting that a large asteroid has a 1 in 75 chance of hitting Mars on January 30th, while another asteroid is headed toward Earth in 2029.
A 1-in-75 shot like the predicted Mars asteroid impact is “wildly unusual,” said Steve Chesley, an astronomer with the Near-Earth Object office, which is tasked with tracking roughly 5,000 asteroids and comets wandering about in Earth’s neighborhood.
“We’re used to dealing with odds like one-in-a-million,” Chesley said. “Something with a one-in-a-hundred chance makes us sit up straight in our chairs.”
The large Mars-bound asteroid, designated 2007 WD5, is about 160 feet across, similar to an asteroid that exploded just before impact in Siberia in 1908. That explosion, the largest impact event in recent history, felled 80 million trees over an incredible 830 square miles.[read more]
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