ASTEROID: SG 2021 - close call for CANADA and GREENLAND...

Asteroid 2021 SG: Bigger than Chelyabinsk

New-found asteroid 2021 SG is some four times larger than the 17-meter (18-yard) space rock that disintegrated over Chelyabinsk, Russia, on February 15, 2013. The Chelyabinsk meteor created a shock wave that broke windows in six Russian cities. It caused some 1,500 people to seek medical attention, mostly from flying glass. But newly found asteroid 2021 SG didn’t hit. It just passed close, at only about half the distance from Earth to the moon, last week. Astronomers finally picked up the asteroid – discovering it for the first time – a day later on September 17, 2021. They were using a large telescope, the 48-inch (1.2 meter) telescope at Mount Palomar in California. Why didn’t they spot it sooner? Because it came from the direction of the sun.

If it entered our atmosphere, an asteroid as big as 2021 SG would produce a huge, very impressive meteor. Asteroid 2021 SG isn’t just big. It’s also a fast-moving asteroid, traveling through space at the amazing speed of 53,281 miles per hour (85,748 km/h or 23.8 km per second), relative to Earth. At closest approach on September 16, 2021, asteroid 2021 SG came closest to Canada and Greenland.


[link to earthsky.org (secure)]


PS. SG 21 i'm claiming this as named after me... hahah