Monster Asteroid dubbed ‘potentially hazardous’ by NASA set to swing by today

Asteroid 468727 (2010 JE87) is currently on its way through the solar system, barreling at extreme speeds. NASA has revealed the asteroid is moving through the solar system at a staggering 14.9 kilometres per second, or 53,640 kilometres per hour. The monster space rock is a whopping 257 metres in length, making it longer than two football pitches end to end.

The asteroid is set to swing by our planet on January 25, and when it does, it will be 15.8 times the distance between our planet and the Moon from us. One distance between the two celestial bodies, called a lunar distance (LD), is 384,317 kilometres. So 15.8 LDs is more than 6 million kilometres. Nonetheless, NASA has described the asteroid as a ‘Near Earth Object’ (NEO), which allows NASA to study the history of the solar system.

Asteroid dubbed ‘potentially hazardous’ by NASA set to swing by tomorrow