Why India endangered through space?


   What if someone told you that Earth is in danger. Ya, it sounds so scary, but it happened in 2020. A San Diego scientist on 16 Aug.2020 was on duty. While doing regular space observations, he noticed some unusual things; he noticed an asteroid '2020 QG'. A small asteroid in space which was traveling around 12.87km per second, and its trajectory was so close to Earth.

   The research began to check wether it is safe or not, and if not then which country was endanger and has most probable chances of being destroyed then.
    Scientists have discovered the country which was endangered was India. The trajectory of the asteroid was above India.

   But the good news was that the size of the asteroid is just ~9.5 to 21 feet (2.9-6.4m) wide. So, scientists need not to worry about it because it was just as size of car. So, if an asteroid enters the Earth's atmosphere, it will start to burn in the air due to friction and sooner it will disappear.

On Aug.16.2020 04:09 UT, asteroid 2020 QG flew about 1,830 miles (2,950 kilometers) away from Earth, and registered its name in the closest known flyby object passes from Earth.  

Nowadays, scientists are searching for more advanced ways to know about such heavenly objects.

Key points:

  • 2020 QG, also known by its internal designation ZTF0DxQ.

  • It belongs to the Apollo group.

  • It was first imaged by the Zwicky Transient Facility (ZTF) at the Palomar Observatory about 6 hours after this closest approach, and was later identified by Kunal Deshmukh, a student at the Indian Institute of Technology Bombay, along with colleagues Kritti Sharma, Chen-Yen Hsu and Bryce T. Bolin analyzing images from the ZTF.


Future approaches:

The 2020 QG will make several close approaches with Earth in the future, albeit at larger distances compared to the August 2020 encounter. The next close approach by 2020 QG will be in May 2028, during which it will pass by Earth from a nominal distance of 0.31 AU (120 LD).

2020 QG flyby spinview.gif

Animation of 2020 QG orbit around Earth.gif

Animation of 2020 QG orbit around Sun.gif