Asteroid 2025 QD8 hurtling towards Earth will come eerily close this week. Does it pose a threat?

NASA has said that an asteroid will make a close flyby of Earth on September 3. Asteroid 2025 QD8 will pass within 218,000 kilometres of Earth at 10:57 am ET. That's close, about 57 per cent of the average distance between Earth and the Moon. Will it pose a threat to our planet? NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) said in an alert that the asteroid will come quite close to Earth. However, it won't be a danger to us. But this is a chance to study an asteroid up close because of the eerily close distance it will be from us. Asteroid 2025 QD8 is 71 feet wide and travelling at a speed of 45,000 kilometres per hour. The Virtual Telescope Project 2.0 will be hosting a livestream of the asteroid flyby using remotely controlled telescopes. You can catch the rock fly live in real time. Astronomers have already clicked some photos of the space rock.

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Project founder and director Gianluca Masi caught the asteroid through the “Elana” telescope and captured a 120-second exposure of 2025 QD8. The 17-inch telescope observed the asteroid at a distance of 1.9 million kilometres. The image captured isn't much and only appears like the tip of a needle, as bright stars throng most of the image. This won't be 2025 QD8's last trip towards Earth, as several more rendezvous are set to occur in the coming years. European Space Agency’s Near-Earth Objects Coordination Centre said that it will keep showing up till the end of the century. Wednesday's encounter will be its closest ever to date based on its part records. The next time it will come this close will be in the year 2121. Its next visit is scheduled for 2038.

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NASA AsteroidWarning 2025

Asteroid 2025 QD8 is a near-Earth asteroid, one of over 40,000 that NASA has observed and recorded since 1980. All asteroids whose orbits bring them within 195 million kilometres of the Sun are classified as NEOs. Since they are constantly roaming around us, they make regular trips to Earth. NASA regularly observes these space rocks to be prepared in case any one of them poses a threat. The space agency and others around the world have been working on technology to intercept a dangerous asteroid. The DART mission, or the Double Asteroid Redirection Test, smashed into Dimorphos, an asteroid moonlet, successfully changing its path. Later studies showed that its shape had changed, and the impact had released massive amounts of debris, which could soon return to Earth as a meteor shower.