Another Near Earth Asteroid Discovered

With most of NASA having gone dark through the government shutdown, the normally steady flow of information released by the agency’s diverse array of ongoing space probes, as well as ongoing interpretation of data from spacecraft which are no longer active, trickled to a near halt.  On the bright side, as the agency begins to get back in to motion, it seems likely that we can look forward to a temporary “burst” of information in the coming weeks.

In the meantime, the world certainly has not stopped, and has not stopped looking up, as evidenced by last week’s discovery of yet another Near Earth Asteroid destined to make a close flyby in the near future. Discovered by astronomers in Ukraine, and then independently confirmed by teams from several other nations, the 400 meter wide asteroid 2013 TV135 is expected to pass close to Earth on August 26, 2032.  According to the story, published in the Russian new service  RIA Novosti, the asteroid is rated as a 1 out of 10 on the Torino scale, which rates a potential impact depending on its overall size, and thus damage it can inflict, versus the likelihood of any impact taking place.

On a related note, on Wednesday, divers searching nearby Lake Chebarkul recovered a 1,323 lb. piece of the meteorite which exploded in the skies over Chelyabinsk, Russia on February 15th.  For comparison’s sake,  that meteor was estimated to be only 17 meters in diameter.