'Potentially dangerous' skyscraper-sized asteroid to approach Earth on Halloween

According to NASA, a recently discovered "potentially dangerous" asteroid the size of a huge skyscraper should fly past the Earth just in time for Halloween, from October 31 to November 1.

It's about an asteroid called 2022 RM4. It has an estimated diameter of 330 to 740 meters - slightly less than the height of the Burj Khalifa in Dubai (828 m), the tallest building on Earth. He get closer with our planet at a speed of about 84,500 km/h, which is about 68 times the speed of sound.

At its closest approach on November 1, the asteroid will approach about 2.3 million kilometers - this is six times exceeds the average distance between the Earth and the Moon, and by space standards is considered very small reserve. It will be within range of home telescopes.

NASA labels any space object that is within 193 million km of Earth as a "near-Earth object" and classifies any large body within 7.5 million km of our planet as "potentially dangerous." Once these threats are detected, astronomers watch them closely, examining them with radar for signs of any deviation from their intended trajectories.

NASA is currently tracking the location and orbits of approximately 28,000 asteroids using the system alerts from ATLAS, an array of four telescopes capable of performing a full scan of the entire night sky every 24 hours. Since launching in 2017, they have already detected over 700 near-Earth asteroids and 66 comets.

Two of the asteroids discovered by ATLAS, 2019 MO and 2018 LA, actually hit the Earth, the first exploded off the southern coast of Puerto Rico, and the second near the border of Botswana and South Africa. Fortunately, these asteroids were small and did not cause any harm.