Asteroid alert! Menacing space rock dashing towards Earth at a fearsome 27376 kmph

NASA expects Asteroid 2023 FS10 to make an extremely close approach to the planet today. Know its speed, distance of approach, size and other details.

Asteroid 2023 FS10 belongs to the Apollo group of asteroids. (Pixabay)

NASA and other space agencies have kept a watchful eye on a particular asteroid which was previously expected to impact Earth. Although it has now been determined it will not crash to the planet's surface, it will make an extremely close approach this decade, giving scientists a chance to study it. Although asteroids often make close approaches with Earth, this happens at relatively safe distances of thousands of kilometers at a minimum. But this does not guarantee that no asteroid is ever going to strike Earth.

NASA has now issued an alert against an asteroid that is expected to make its closest approach to Earth today.

Asteroid 2023 FS10 information

The asteroid has been named Asteroid 2023 FS10 by NASA's Center for Near-Earth Object Studies. The same organization has also revealed its trajectory, distance of close approach and expected speed. Asteroid 2023 FS10 will pass Earth today, April 12, at a distance of 1.2 million kilometers. In fact, it is already rushing towards the planet, travelling at a fearsome speed of 27376 kilometers per hour.

Although its passing distance will be close, the asteroid does not pose any major threat to the planet, due to its relatively small size. NASA estimates this space rock to be around 67 feet wide, making it as big as an aircraft.

It belongs to the Apollo group of asteroids, which are Earth-crossing space rocks with semi-major axes larger than Earth's. They are named after the humongous 1862 Apollo asteroid, discovered by German astronomer Karl Reinmuth in the 1930s.

NASA's asteroid tracking tech

NASA tracks asteroids using a combination of ground-based and space-based telescopes. The NASA-funded Asteroid Terrestrial-impact Last Alert System (ATLAS) scans the night sky for moving objects and reports any potential asteroid detections, while some space-based observatories use infrared sensors to detect asteroids and their characteristics. Some of these include the Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE) and the NEOWISE mission.