Over the weekend, an asteroid collided with the Earth barely two hours after an astronomer spotted the space rock.
On March 11, astronomer Krisztián Sárneczky used the Schmidt telescope at the Piszkésteto Mountain Station to observe asteroid 2022 EB5, a tiny stony object.
It collided with Earth's atmosphere north of Iceland two hours later.
5th Earth impactor from Piszkéstető Obs: 2022 EB5
— Stefan Kurti (@KurtiStefan) March 12, 2022
Yesterday at 19:24 UT an unknown moving objects of 17 mag was found by K. Sárneczky on images from 0.6-m Schmidt telescope. Acquired data 30 min later showed that it was going to collide with Earth in 2 hours time. pic.twitter.com/NdLUcF1MnM
According to estimates obtained by EarthSky, the asteroid was 10 feet large and moved about 11 miles per second.
In comparison, Earth's orbital speed is 18 miles per second (30 kilometers per second).
Because of the air friction, the entire or part of the little asteroid would have vaporized throughout its journey through Earth's atmosphere.
As a result of its direct impact on the atmosphere, a brilliant meteor, or shooting star, known as a fireball, should have resulted.
Before impact, which occurred at 4:22 pm ET on Friday in the atmosphere north of Iceland, the space rock became the fifth asteroid to be discovered before striking Earth.
Even if the space rock had collided with the ground, it would have caused minimal damage because it was just 10 feet (3 meters) wide. That is about half the size of a giraffe.
A mosaic image of asteroid Eros at its north pole taken by the robotic NEAR Shoemaker space probe February 14, 2000 immediately after the spacecraft's insertion into orbit
Where Asteroid Landed Remains Unclear
It's unclear what happened to 2022 EB5, although it's thought it either burnt up in the atmosphere or landed into the Arctic Ocean. It's also unknown whether any of the remaining bits made it to the ground if it burnt up.
On the other hand, the International Meteor Organization is seeking information from anybody who may have observed the spectacular meteor of 2022 EB5.
A few people in Iceland saw a flash of light or heard a boom. If you believe you saw the meteor, you may report it using this link.
Most asteroids in the Solar System orbit the Sun in a massive ring between Mars and Jupiter's orbits.
According to estimates, more than 200 asteroids are more than 60 miles in diameter in the Asteroid Belt.
NASA said there are 1.1 million to 1.9 million asteroids bigger than 0.6 miles in diameter and millions smaller ones.
How Rare Meteorite Hits Earth
Thousands of small meteorite pieces impact the Earth each year, despite large collisions being extremely rare.
The majority of these occurrences, on the other hand, are unforeseen and go unreported because they occur in vast swaths of unoccupied woods or open ocean areas.
According to Daily Mail, the first asteroid was 2008 TC3, an 80-tonne, 13-foot-wide (4.1-meter) object that burst over Sudan's Nubian Desert in October 2008. The asteroid yielded 600 meteorites, which were eventually retrieved.
A near-Earth asteroid named 2014 AA entered the Earth's atmosphere over Venezuela in 2014, while in 2018, LA struck four years later and left debris near the Botswana-South Africa border.
2019 MO, the fourth asteroid to be seen before it collided with Earth, exploded in a harmless 5-kiloton-equivalent explosion off the coast of Puerto Rico two years ago.
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