Asteroid Alert!

Last March, a giant space rock zoomed past our planet at about 77,000 miles per hour! It was the fastest asteroid to pass by Earth in 2021. It was also the largest.

Scientists estimate that the asteroid was about 2,230 feet wide. That’s about the width of 10 jumbo jets lined up next to each other wing to wing!

Luckily, the asteroid didn’t pose any danger for our planet.

Millions of asteroids travel around the sun. Each year, thousands of the rocks enter Earth’s atmosphere. Most of them burn up in it. Those that make it to Earth are often small. They often fall into the ocean.

But about 65 million years ago, a huge asteroid slammed into Earth. It was the size of a small city. The crash created a worldwide cloud of dirt and rock. This cloud blocked out sunlight for decades. Some scientists says that’s what killed the dinosaurs.

NASA’s Lindley Johnson says we don’t have to worry about that happening again anytime soon. Today, scientists use powerful telescopes to track big asteroids.

Johnson says, “We will spot any large asteroids many years, if not centuries, before they are a threat.”