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NASA asteroid watch 2019: 7 asteroids will fly by Earth this weekend; Should people be worried?

A concept image of an asteroid approaching the Earth. | Photo by urikyo33/Pixabay.com

Several asteroids have come close to the Earth over the previous days, and a few more will approach the planet this weekend. Scientists from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) have detected that seven more space rocks will fly by Earth on Saturday.

Asteroids are some of the near-Earth objects (NEO) that agencies like NASA regularly observe. While they regularly approach the planet, people have no reason to worry as scientists have not detected any actual impact happening.

Four asteroids are approaching Earth on Saturday

This has been an asteroid-filled week with seven more are set to approach Earth over the weekend, and four of them are confirmed to have a close-approach on Saturday. These asteroids are named 2019 TN1, 2019 SK8, 2019 SV9, and 2019 SE2. Again, people do not have to worry about these space rocks because they will all keep a distance from Earth by hundreds of thousands of miles.

The 2019 TN1 asteroid has an estimated diameter of 11 meters to 25 meters and will have a minimum close-approach distance (measured from the Earth’s center to the asteroid’s center) of 0.03275 astronomical units (au). Note that 1 au equals to more than 92 million miles. A slightly bigger asteroid, 2019 SK8, also approaches Earth on Saturday with an estimated diameter of 16 meters to 35 meters, and its minimum close-approach distance from the planet is at 0.02683 au.

NEO 2019 SV9 measures larger at up to 53-meter wide and will fly by with a fewer gap from the Earth at 0.02185 au. The last asteroid passing by Earth on Saturday is 2019 SE2. It is also the biggest of the four with an estimated diameter between 41 meters to 92 meters but has the farthest minimum close-approach distance at 0.04901 au.

Three more space rocks will close this week’s asteroid watch

On Sunday, three more NEOs are confirmed to pass by Earth, namely 2019 TQ3, 2019 TH2, and 2019 TT1. Asteroids 2019 TQ3 and 2019 TT1 are about the same diameter size of at least 17 meters. Meanwhile, 2019 TH2 is a little bit smaller at 14 meters to 31 meters in diameter. As of this writing, no other NEOs have been detected to approach Earth until Wednesday, Oct. 16.

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