Science & Tech
You can watch a huge, mile-wide asteroid fly safely by Earth today
A huge asteroid more than a mile wide will zoom safely by Earth today and you can watch it live today in a free online webcast.
The asteroid, known as asteroid 7335 (1989 JA), is four times the size of the Empire State Building and will pass the Earth at a distance about 10 times that of the space between the Earth and moon. It is the largest asteroid flyby of 2022 yet, but the space rock will remain at a perfectly safe distance to our planet.
The Virtual Telescope Project will run a webcast of the flyby at 9 a.m. EDT (1300 GMT) on May 27; you can watch the flyby in the window above or directly through the project's website (opens in new tab).
Asteroid 7335 (1989 JA) is roughly 1.1. miles (1.8 kilometers) in diameter and its closest approach is a quite healthy 2.5 million miles (4 million km) away from Earth. The asteroid should be bright enough to glimpse in a moderate-sized amateur telescope, particularly from the southern hemisphere, Virtual Telescope Project founder Gianluca Masi noted.
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