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+12 +1
The Tunguska event
That disastrous rock may now look to have been a Beta Taurid passenger. By Robby Berman.
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+23 +1
Asteroids are stronger, harder to destroy than previously thought
A popular theme in the movies is that of an incoming asteroid that could extinguish life on the planet, and our heroes are launched into space to blow it up. But incoming asteroids may be harder to break than scientists previously thought, finds a Johns Hopkins study that used a new understanding of rock fracture and a new computer modeling method to simulate asteroid collisions.
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+2 +1
A Meteor More Powerful Than 10 Atomic Bombs Exploded Over the Bering Sea
The December 18 fireball created the biggest airburst since the Chelyabinsk meteor of 2013. By Becky Ferreira.
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+4 +1
NASA Mission Reveals Asteroid Has Big Surprises
A NASA spacecraft that will return a sample of a near-Earth asteroid named Bennu to Earth in 2023 made the first-ever close-up observations of particle plumes erupting from an asteroid’s surface. Bennu also revealed itself to be more rugged than expected, challenging the mission team to alter its flight and sample collection plans, due to the rough terrain.
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Fossil 'mother lode' records Earth-shaking asteroid's impact: study
Scientists in the US say they have discovered the fossilized remains of a mass of creatures that died minutes after a huge asteroid slammed into the Earth 66 million years ago, sealing the fate of the dinosaurs. In a paper to be published Monday, a team of paleontologists headquartered at the University of Kansas say they found a "mother lode of exquisitely preserved animal and fish fossils" in what is now North Dakota.
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+3 +1
Plastic Explosives Dropped On An Asteroid by Japan
In the early morning of April 5th, Japan's spacecraft "Hayabusa2" detonated plastic explosives that were carefully placed on the surface of an asteroid. The goal was not to annihilate the asteroid but rather to help the scientists to collect new data to further the study. The researchers watched it happen from the mission control center located in Sagamihara, Japan. As the Hayabusa2 carefully carried out the project they called the Small Carry-on Impactor, the researchers were quietly observing from the station, looking very happy about how it was slowly unfolding.
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+19 +1
Iron volcanoes may have erupted on metal asteroids
Metallic asteroids are thought to have started out as blobs of molten iron floating in space. As if that's not strange enough, scientists now think that as the metal cooled and solidified, volcanoes spewing liquid iron could have erupted through a solid iron crust onto the surface of the asteroid. This scenario emerged from an analysis by planetary scientists at UC Santa Cruz whose investigation was prompted in part by NASA's plans to launch a probe to...
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+31 +1
Comet Ingredients Swallowed by an Asteroid, Found Sealed Inside a Meteorite
The raw materials from a comet have been found sealed inside a pristine, primitive meteorite. The meteorite was found in the LaPaz icefield of Antarctica and has weathered very little since the time it crashed to Earth. According to a new study published today (April 15) in the journal Nature Astronomy, researchers found that this sample of space rock contains something strange: bits of the building blocks of a comet that became trapped in the meteorite's parent asteroid just 3 million years after the solar system formed.
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+3 +1
The moon is losing 200 tons of water a year to meteorite strikes
When meteorites slam into the moon, they undoubtedly kick up a little dust. Now, a new study suggests they also shake loose quite a bit of water—something on the order of 200 tons each year. Planetary scientists were tipped to the leaching after reviewing sensor data from a moon-orbiting probe. Between November 2013 and April 2014, the Lunar Atmosphere and Dust Environment Explorer recorded occasional spikes in the numbers of particles, including water molecules, that were lofted off the moon.
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+11 +1
A House-Size Asteroid Zipped by Earth Today
An asteroid the size of a house gave Earth a close shave today (April 18), passing nearer to our planet than any other space rock will for the rest of this year — that is, as far as we know. Named 2019 GC6, the asteroid was discovered by NASA's Catalina Sky Survey near Tucson, Arizona, just last Tuesday (April 9), nine days before it flew by Earth. The giant rock made its closest approach this morning at 2:41 a.m. EDT (0641 GMT), when it whizzed by our plant at a safe distance of about 136,000 miles (219,000 kilometers), or slightly more than half the average distance between Earth and the moon.
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+8 +1
Nearby asteroids reveal sizes of distant stars
By watching asteroids pass in front of two stars, researchers have measured the stars' sizes, paving the way for more direct observations of distant suns.
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+3 +1
Japan succeeds in creating world's 1st man-made crater on asteroid
Japan's Hayabusa2 space probe has successfully created a man-made crater on an asteroid that altered the body's terrain in a historical first, the country's space agency said Thursday.
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+4 +1
NASA chief warns that people need to take the threat of a meteor crashing into Earth much more seriously
NASA's administrator warned that the threat of a meteor crashing into Earth is bigger than we might think. Jim Bridenstine told the International Academy of Astronautics' Planetary Defense Conference on Monday that "the reason it's important for NASA to take this seriously is something you call the 'giggle factor,'" or scientific theories that seem too ridiculous to be likely.
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+24 +1
Water found in samples from the surface of an asteroid
Scientists have made the first measurements of water in samples collected from the surface of an asteroid, according to a new study. The Japanese space probe Hayabusa completed a sample return mission from the asteroid Itokawa, retrieving 1,500 particles. Another mission, Hayabusa2, is conducting a sample return mission on the asteroid Ryugu.
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+26 +1
Nasa has started preparing for the arrival of the 'God of Chaos'
Nasa is already preparing for the arrival of a huge asteroid named the “God of Chaos” that will skirt past Earth in 10 years. On 13 April, 2029, people looking towards the sky will see a speck of light streaking across it, which will quickly get brighter and faster. It will be travelling so fast that it will cross the width of the Moon in a minute and be as bright as stars in the sky.
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+26 +1
Fake asteroid hurtling at New York City triggers terrifying results in NASA simulation
In a NASA simulation of a fictional scenario, New York City was hit with an asteroid packing 1,000 times the destruction of the nuclear bomb dropped on Hiroshima. The exercise, which was part of the "National Near-Earth Object Preparedness Strategy and Action Plan" published by the White House, played out at the the 2019 Planetary Defense Conference in College Park, Maryland, last week. It was a worst-case scenario showing what would happen if a giant space rock crashed into Earth in 2027.
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+18 +1
Mile-wide asteroid with its own moon to pass Earth on Saturday
A mile-long, walnut-shaped asteroid with its own moon is set to pass Earth on Saturday, according to scientists. The asteroid, known as 1999 KW4, will come within 3.2 million miles of Earth -- its second-closest approach in the past 20 years, WGRZ-TV reported. While this is considered close it’s still a safe distance from Earth.
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+44 +1
Mission to rare metal asteroid could spark space mining boom
All that glitters ... may be gold. At least that’s what scientists think about a shiny, Massachusetts-size asteroid that may be chock-full of precious metals. NASA recently approved a mission to visit the metallic space rock, which orbits the sun in the main asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter. The mission — the first to a metal asteroid — could reveal secrets about our solar system’s earliest days while setting the stage for a future space mining industry.
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+15 +1
Hayabusa2 lands on an asteroid and sends back amazing pictures to prove it
Japan’s Hayabusa2 mission to the asteroid Ryugu is an ambitious one to begin with, and the team recently made the decision to up the stakes with a second touchdown on the space rock’s surface. Not only did all go as planned, but we now have the best shots of an asteroid’s surface ever to be sent back to Earth.
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+11 +1
‘It snuck up on us’: Scientists stunned by ‘city-killer’ asteroid that just missed Earth
“People are only sort of realizing what happened pretty much after it’s already flung past us,” one astronomer said.
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