Feared Apophis Impact Ruled Out – Asteroid Will Pass Close Enough to Earth to See with Naked Eye

upstart writes in with an IRC submission:

Feared Apophis Impact Ruled Out - Asteroid Will Pass Close Enough to Earth to See With Naked Eye:

New observations of asteroid Apophis - thought to pose a slight risk of impacting Earth in 2068 - rule out any chance of impact for at least a century. After 17 years of observations and orbit analysis, ESA is removing the enormous asteroid from its Risk List.

Estimated at about 350 m across[*] - equivalent to the length of three football fields - Apophis has been in and out of the headlines for years as astronomers have tried to pinpoint its precise orbit and the possibility of any future impact.

Soon after its detection in 2004, astronomers predicted two impact possibilities in 2029 and 2036, but additional observations of the near-Earth object (NEO) thankfully ruled these out. Until now, a small but concerning chance of impact in 2068 remained.

[...] New radar observations of Apophis were taken in early March by NASA's Goldstone Deep Space Communications Complex in California and the Green Bank Observatory, West Virginia. They have provided enough data on the orbit of the infamous asteroid to finally rule out, with certainty, any Earth impact for at least 100 years.

[...] The next and closest of these swing-bys will take place on Friday, April 13, 2029, when Apophis will pass less than 35,000 km from Earth and be visible to the naked eye. At ten times closer than the Moon, Apophis will be closer than satellites orbiting in the Geostationary ring.

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