An unexpected sight appeared in the sky Monday morning
As CNET reports, an asteroid the size of a 10-story building passed half way between the Earth and the moon shortly after scientists at the Catalina Sky Survey first discovered it on Saturday.
Asteroid 2017 AG13was from 36 to 111 feet across and was traveling at a speed of 10 miles per second, according to the Slooh Observatory.
But it wasn’t big enough to cause extinction, had it struck Earth, although damage similar to that seen in 2013 when a bolide collided over the Russian City of Chelyabinsk would likely have been incurred if a decent size chunk of the asteroid had made it through Earth’s upper atmosphere near a populated area.
While the 100,000-mile distance from Earth seems far away, the fly-by is considered a close shave in the cosmic sense. Most asteroids pass by Earth at a distance several times farther than the moon, CNET reports, so this was a close buzz, relatively speaking.
The asteroid’s rate of speed and dim brightness level is what made it so difficult to spot.
There's more on this, including a video about Asteroid 2017 AG13, at CNET's website.
