3 ms·
Really cool link, thank you. I think you are referring to the 2017 QP1 asteroid that was closest to us on 14-Aug. the distance was about a sixth of the distance
by credit_guy 9y ago
Really cool link, thank you. I think you are referring to the 2017 QP1 asteroid that was closest to us on 14-Aug. the distance was about a sixth of the distance to the moon, or 38k miles. The speed was 24km/s and the diameter 37-83 meters. Just for fun I ran the Impact Earth calculator to see what would happed if such an asteroid hit Earth. Assuming the worst case scenario (iron meteorite, max diameter, perpendicular hit) the explosion would be equivalent to about 200 MT TNT, and the crater would have a 2 mile diameter and 2000 foot depth.
Edit: changed mph to km/s
https://www.purdue.edu/impactearth/ https://www.purdue.edu/impactearth/
- imaginenore 9y ago> The speed was 24mph No way. It was 24 km/second.
- credit_guy 9y agoGood catch, thanks.
- WalterBright 9y agoSpeed values in space always seem to omit "relative to what" clarifications. Relative to the earth, the sun, along the earth's orbital path or contra, etc.? It makes a huge difference.
- credit_guy 9y agoThe Parent's link did give the definition, my summary didn't. "V relative (km/s) Object velocity relative to Earth at close-approach."
- hutzlibu 9y ago.. so 4 times as strong as the biggest men made explosion? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tsar_Bomba https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tsar_Bomba Well, thats bad for sure, but far from humanity-threatening, I guess.