An asteroid discovered days ago will narrowly miss Earth (today, just before 6pm eastern time) uh-oh!

[orleans]

https://www.cnn.com/2026/05/18/science/asteroid-earth-close-pass

An asteroid discovered days ago will narrowly miss Earth

An asteroid roughly the size of one to two school buses will fly by Earth Monday, coming as close as 91,593 kilometers (56,913 miles), according to the European Space Agency — equivalent to about one quarter of the distance between Earth and the moon.

Astronomers at the Mount Lemmon Survey in Tucson, Arizona, discovered the asteroid on May 10 and named it 2026JH2. The object belongs to a class of asteroids called Apollo, which orbit the sun on trajectories that intersect with Earth’s own orbit around the sun.

At its closest pass, 2026JH2 will be about 24% of the average distance between Earth and the moon, and about two and a half times the distance at which hundreds of geosynchronous satellites orbit, providing services such as telecommunications and weather forecasts. The close pass is expected to occur on Monday just before 6 p.m. ET, according to NASA’s JPL Small-Body Database.

more at link

[wcmagumba]

1. I wonder what kind of damage this asteroid would cause if it hit the Earth...

Of course it depends on where it would hit, it probably would take out any large city, maybe even an entire state or country...scary...

[sarisataka]

4. It is estimated an asteroid the size of a house (larger than this one)

would impact with the approximate force of the Hiroshima bomb ~20kt.

So this could be damaging but not apocalyptic.

[popsdenver]

13. LOL

That's what they told the dinosaurs.....LOL


I have often wondered this past decade, if this Republican group knows of some impending asteroid strike to planet earth, because they are all acting like there is no tomorrow, and doing whatever they please even if it is illegal, immoral, corrupt, etc...

[EdmondDantes_]

24. That meteor was 6-9 miles. That's a lot bigger than 50-150 feet.

[misanthrope]

21. Not nearly as much

as the asteroid named Homo Sapiens.

[Metaphorical]

6. Yeah, about Hiroshima

However, it has a 90% chance of landing in the ocean (most likely the Pacific), and at that size will likely be an airburst. Most asteroids move along the plane of the ecliptic, putting it on an equatorial path this time of year - upper South America, the Southern Sahara, so forth as possible land targets.

[mopinko]

11. it wd take out a lot of satellites, i presume.

that wd wreak some havoc.

[dweller]

2. Oh thank god

https://m.

&pp=ygUUV2F0ZXJ3b3JsZCBvaCBteSBnb2Q%3D





✌🏻

[bustedbiscuits]

3. Disappointed

Disappointed about the narrow miss. Anything to end this living hell reality.

[EuterpeThelo]

22. Yeah, same.

Welcome to DU!

[Attilatheblond]

5. Thanks for the heads up! Will dust off my hard hat!

One of my fav sites, SpaceWeather, has a nifty chart of known Near Earth Asteroids, by date. Yeah, sometimes the observers miss the 'sneaky ones' in time to put them up on the chart.

Near Earth Asteroids on the chart have data regarding size, velocity, distance from earth (measured in 'lunar distances' for scale) Handy source for known NEAs, but astronomers do get surprised from time to time. Also just a fun site for those who like to look up.

https://spaceweather.com/]

[Norrrm]

7. Let it go by.

[no_hypocrisy]

8. Damn! I was going to use that for Orrex tomorrow.

You know, "Is he dead yet?"

[betsuni]

9. Don't look up!

[Brother Buzz]

17. I see what you did there

[MineralMan]

10. Too small to see, though.

It's a miss. It's small. Minor story.

[paleotn]

18. Unless it's not a miss and you're in the trajectory.

Makes you wonder how many others are out there we know nothing about. A lot of them probably. For me, every warm sunny day when nothing comes blazing out of the sky is a gift in the light of the great probability engine that is the universe.

[RoseTrellis]

25. Exactly why

Exactly why we need to colonize the moon.
Human beings need to be able to get off the earth and establish a base to avoid extinction.
It’s coming, sooner or later.

[James48]

12. Maralago

Please.

[Martin Eden]

14. We're all gonna die!!!

That true statement has nothing to do with any asteroid.

Plain fact of the matter is, Father Time is undefeated.

[paleotn]

16. Funny thing, when you're young, you don't think much about Father Time.

But as you age, Ponce de León's supposed search for the fountain of youth begins to make sense.

[Martin Eden]

23. Time, by Pink Floyd

I've been listening to Dark Side of the Moon since 1973, and the lyrics to Time hit a lot harder now that I'm 68.

Ticking away the moments that make up a dull day
You fritter, and waste the hours in an offhand way
Kicking around on a piece of ground in your hometown
Waiting for someone or something to show you the way
Tired of lying in the sunshine, staying home to watch the rain
You are young and life is long and there is time to kill today
And then one day you find ten years have got behind you
No one told you when to run, you missed the starting gun

And you run, and you run to catch up with the sun, but it′s sinking
Racing around to come up behind you again
The sun is the same in a relative way, but you're older
Shorter of breath, and one day closer to death
Every year is getting shorter, never seem to find the time
Plans that either come to naught or half a page of scribbled lines
Hanging on in quiet desperation is the English way
The time is gone, the song is over, thought I′d something more to say

Home, home again
I like to be here when I can
When I come home, cold and tired
It's good to warm my bones beside the fire
Far away, across the field
The tolling of the iron bell
Calls the faithful to their knees
To hear the softly spoken magic spells

[paleotn]

27. That they do.

[paleotn]

15. Close shave. 57K miles may seem like a lot.....

But when that big rock is moving at 50K to 70K mph relative to the sun, that's a bit disconcerting. A little gravitational tug here or there, even years ago, and it could be a very bad day for some people on earth. Not Chicxulub by any means but you don't want to be anywhere near the air burst or impact if parts survive entering our atmosphere. Whole lot of rocks out there. Many we know nothing about. Scary stuff

[BH liberal]

19. The skywatchers should be able...

to locate these rocks in time for everyone to set up their office pools on where it's going to hit.

[Uncle Joe]

20. That's three minutes from now

Thanks for the thread orleans

[orleans]

28. you're welcome. i heard joan esposito (on wcpt) mention this so i googled and found a couple articles.

i think abc had an article too.

i forgot to think of this when the time came. oh well. (memory can be a fleeting thing...

[Irish_Dem]

26. Tell Trump it is made of priceless rare minerals.

He needs to be at the exact spot where it lands to steal it before anyone else can.