Astronomers announced that the largest asteroid predicted to pass Earth this year will bypass our planet on March 21, making it an opportunity for scientists to study the “potentially hazardous asteroid.”
Daily Current Affairs Quiz 2021
It is a near-Earth asteroid classified as a potentially hazardous asteroid of the Apollo group.
With an estimated diameter of 440–680 m (1,400–2,200 ft), it was discovered by the Lincoln Near-Earth Asteroid Research at Socorro, New Mexico on 23 March 2001.
The asteroid will safely pass by Earth on 21 March 2021.
It won’t come closer than 2 million km to Earth, but still, that distance is close in astronomical terms, which is why 2001 FO32 has been designated a “potentially hazardous asteroid”.
