For those who want to worry about weightier issues than John Kerry’s orange tan, today Asteriod 4179 Toutatis, almost 3 miles long and 1½ wide, makes a close approach to Earth. “Close” means, admittedly, slightly less than a million miles, so the panic button is best left unpressed. But people who hope that modern science will soon prolong our lives indefinitely may want to look ahead nervously:
NASA scientists and other asteroid experts have been watching Toutatis for more than a decade, and though its orbit changes slightly with each 4-year trip around the Sun, they have a good handle on the path.
The position of the asteroid on this pass is known to a precision roughly equal to the rock’s size, said Alan Harris, a senior research scientist at the Space Science Institute. That leaves a little wiggle room for its exact location at closest approach, but not much.
“Because of the nature of the orbit, we cannot predict thousands of years into the future for this object, but in anyone’s lifetime now, there is no chance” of an impact, Harris told SPACE.com.
For current values of “lifetime”.
Addendum: Toutatis being the biggest asteroid whose orbit brings it near the Earth, its name is fitting:
The discoverers named the asteroid after a Celtic/Gallic god whose name is invoked often in the well known comic book series Les Aventures d'Asterix, set in ancient Gaul. Toutatis is the protector of Asterix and his compatriots, who fear nothing (except that someday the sky may fall on their heads.)
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