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24 Jul, 2019 07:39

Closer than the Moon: 3 giant asteroids whizz by Earth in one day

Closer than the Moon: 3 giant asteroids whizz by Earth in one day

The Earth has been spared from an apocalyptic scenario after three massive asteroids zipped by our planet on Wednesday – with one of the giant space rocks passing closer than the Moon.

With a diameter of up to 120 meters, asteroid 2019 OD soared past our planet moving at roughly 43,000 miles per hour at a distance of 222,160 miles from Earth, NASA’s Center for Near-Earth Object Studies (CNEOS) said. The celestial object capable of inflicting massive damage was closer to Earth than our immediate satellite the Moon, which lies 238,900 miles away.

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Asteroids 2019 OE and 2015 HM10 also zipped by Earth at a distance of 600,494 miles and 2,914,164 miles, respectively.NASA discovers an average of 30 Near-Earth Objects (NEOs) every week – and the chances of a large NEO colliding with Earth is astronomically small.

In June, a “potentially hazardous” asteroid flew by Earth at a distance of 4.2 million miles. A month earlier, an asteroid so large that it had its own moon came hurtling towards Earth – but never got within five million miles of us.

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