Near-Earth objects and close calls

share with us what you discover?
I think it's up and coming perhaps with so much data being collected with the current celestial activity.
Again why now would the University of Hawaii bring up the past, as well as many, many, other news site's that I linked.

Currently 2018 VP1 on (Nov. 2), passed with no issues other maybe a resent fireball in Lexington, KY. (a minor blip on the radar).

So stay tuned and lets us keep networking the data. The Universe is responding to current unrest, just like the Book said.
 
So I don’t know if posting this here in this thread is the right place, but last night I was driving and I saw this glowing light in the sky. At first I thought it was an antenna light but then I saw a tail coming out I’m of it and started to move horizontally and then upward, then I suspected was a rocket 🚀 ( I live in Orlando) but then the tail started to change colors so I think this is a fireball, although at the end looks like it disappears. Idk it was strange so I recorded it.
Here is (I uploaded it on youtube):

 
Apohis „God of Chaos“ has apparently changed its trajectory and is now coming even more dangerously close to earth in 2029 and 2068. I highly reccomend to subscribe to the channel:


Maybe Apohis and/or some of his companions out there are the real reasons for the unpresidented global corona lockdown/fear/madness?
 

Nov 3, 2020
This video is related to AMS #6254-2020
Crossing the Oresund Bridge from Sweden to Denmark. While leaving the bridge and approaching Peberholm, looking towards Dragør, we saw this falling bright light - but what is it?


This is the orbit of a meteor taken with a wide-angle camera at Hiratsuka's home and Fuji's parents' home in October 2020. The full-angle camera captured 5205 meteors, and 500 meteors were able to determine their orbits accurately. The yellow line is the orbit of a meteor, the blue line is the orbit of a planet, and the blue dot is the earth. It focuses on bright meteors and fireballs, and does not include dark meteors from telephoto cameras.
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This is the ground path of a meteor taken with a wide-angle camera at my home in Hiratsuka and my parents' home in Fuji in October 2020. The yellow line is the meteor, the red point is the vanishing point, and the blue point is the observation location. Even in the narrow area of Hiratsuka and Fuji, you can actually see such a wide range of meteors.

Space Weather
Every night, a networkof NASA all-sky cameras scans the skies above the United States for meteoritic fireballs. Automated software maintained by NASA's Meteoroid Environment Office calculates their orbits, velocity, penetration depth in Earth's atmosphere and many other characteristics. Daily results are presented here on Spaceweather.com.
On Nov. 07, 2020, the network reported 18 fireballs.
(15 sporadics, 1 Northern Taurid, 1 chi Taurid, 1 November Draconid)
17stationsCROP.jpg

On November 8, 2020 there were 2037 potentially hazardous asteroids.
The Minor Planet Center (MPC)
 
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Passage of meteor seen across skies of Rome

Translated using DeepL

A great glow in the skies of the Capital: here is the passage of a meteorite

On the afternoon of Friday, November 6, 2020, many people saw a meteorite passing over the sky of Rome, also sighted in Guidonia, Tivoli and Rieti. A fireball that some witnesses commented in amazement: "A truly wonderful spectacle". Already in the past another asteroid had appeared in the skies of the peninsula.

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Rome, meteorite in the skies of the Capital

Around 5.45 p.m. on Friday 6th November, a meteorite was seen in the sky of Rome, sighted also in other provinces of Lazio such as Guidonia, Rieti and Tivoli.

On social networks, many people describe the scene and the passage of the incadenscent fireball: "A truly unique and wonderful spectacle". Even in nearby Abruzzo there are those who claim to have glimpsed a sort of shooting star in the sky.

[...]
 
Apohis „God of Chaos“ has apparently changed its trajectory and is now coming even more dangerously close to earth in 2029 and 2068.

From Space.com:

Asteroid Apophis is speeding up from sunlight as scientists recalculate odds of 2068 impact

Astronomers say they'll have to keep an eye on the near-Earth asteroid Apophis to see how much of a danger the space rock poses to our planet during a close pass in 2068. But don't panic: The chances of an impact still seem very low.

Under certain circumstances, the sun can heat an asteroid unevenly, causing the space rock to radiate away heat energy asymmetrically. The result can be a tiny push in a certain direction — an effect called Yarkovsky acceleration, which can change the path of an asteroid through space.

Since astronomers hadn't measured this solar push on Apophis before, they didn't take it into consideration when calculating the threat the asteroid poses to us in 2068. Those previous calculations showed a tiny impact probability — around 1 in 150,000.

Now, a new study shows the asteroid is drifting away from its previously predicted orbit by about 557 feet (170 meters) a year due to the Yarkovsky effect, lead author and University of Hawaii at Manoa astronomer David Tholen said during a press conference on Oct. 26.

"Basically, the heat that an asteroid radiates gives it a very tiny push," he explained during a virtual meeting of the American Astronomical Society's Division for Planetary Sciences. You can find the press conference on YouTube here. It begins at the 22-minute mark.

"The warmer hemisphere [of the asteroid] would be pushing slightly more than the cooler hemisphere, and that causes the asteroid to drift away from what a purely gravitational orbit would predict," Tholen said.

Showing the orbit for the 1,120-foot-wide (340 m) Apophis, he indicated that astronomers thought they had enough observations of the asteroid — collected over the years after its discovery in 2004 — to more or less rule out an impact in 2068. Those calculations, however, were based on an orbit not affected by the sun's energy. Ultimately, this means we can't yet rule out Apophis being a threat in 2068, Tholen said.

"The 2068 impact scenario is still in play," Tholen said. "We need to track this asteroid very carefully."

Fortunately, the asteroid will make a close (yet still safe) approach to our planet in 2029, allowing ground-based telescopes — including the Arecibo Observatory's powerful radar dish — to get a more detailed look at the asteroid's surface and shape. Apophis will be so close it will be visible with the naked eye, at third magnitude — about as bright as the binary star Cor Caroli.

"Of all dates, Friday the 13th in April, April 13 [2029], is when the flyby will occur," Tholen said., "Obviously, the 2029 close approach is critical. We'll know after that occurs exactly where it [Apophis] was as it passed the Earth, and that will make it much easier for us to predict future impact scenarios."

Tholen's team made the discovery after four nights of observation in January and March with the Subaru Telescope, a Japanese optical-infrared telescope on the summit of Maunakea, Hawaii. The researchers collected 18 exposures of the asteroid at a very high precision, with an error of only 10 milliarcseconds in each observation. (A milliarcsecond is a thousandth of an arcsecond, an angular measurement that helps scientists measure cosmic distances.)

"We really nailed the position of this asteroid extremely well," Tholen said. "That was enough to give us a strong detection of the Yarkovsky effect, which is something we've been expecting to see now for a while."

Tholen noted that Apophis has been troublesome for astronomers, with "numerous impact scenarios" predicted (and then largely ruled out) since it was first found in 2004. For example: Initially, scientists calculated a 3% chance of Apophis slamming into our planet in 2029, a prediction Tholen said was quickly ruled out after more observations showed the true path of the little world.

If there's any threat of an impact, astronomers will know long before 2068 how to approach the problem. Engineers around the world are developing ideas about how to deflect dangerous asteroids from our planet, concepts that range from gravitational tugs to "kinetic impactors" that would knock an incoming rock off course.

A joint European-NASA mission will also test and observe asteroid deflection at a space rock called Didymos, starting in 2022. If all goes to plan, NASA's Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART) spacecraft will slam into "Didymoon," the moon orbiting Didymos. The European Space Agency will then launch the Hera mission in 2023 or 2024 and reach Didymos two years later, to see how well the kinetic impactor did in moving the moon from its previous orbit.

NASA has a dedicated Planetary Defense Coordination Office that collects asteroid observations from a network of partner telescopes, and which runs through scenarios with other U.S. agencies for asteroid deflection or (in the worst case) evacuating threatened populations from an incoming space rock. So far, decades of observations have found no imminent asteroid or comet threats to our planet.
 

And right after a meteor was sighted over Rome, another one flew across the skies of Naples and Sorrento the following day!

(Translated using DeepL).

Huge meteor in the skies of Naples and Sorrento: the enchanting images of the entrance into the atmosphere.

The images of the meteor that yesterday crossed the skies of Naples and Sorrento.

meteorite-napoli-sorrento.jpg


A huge meteor was sighted in the skies of Campania yesterday, Saturday 7 November 2020. The sighting takes place the day after the meteorite observation in the skies of Rome, Tivoli and Rieti.

It was reported by Nello Ruocco who carried out the observation from the Observatory of Sorrento. Ruocco writes on Facebook: "It has been quite a while since we have seen a beautiful meteor in our sky! Here it is, with a final "bang", taken tonight from the allskycam of the Sorrento Observatory. You can also watch the film so that you can see the phenomenon and its speed as it enters the atmosphere".
 
Japan has been drawing it's share bolides lately. Maybe this predawn activity is part of the lock down.

Just a while ago, a long-path fireball flowed! It looks like a long-path fireball that flowed at 23:13 on November 10, 2020 was seen with a wide-angle camera from his home in Hiratsuka toward the northern sky. The vanishing point side is shown.
After a big explosion at the end, meteor marks remained for a while.

It is a comparative bright composite image, a ground path, and an orbit of a long-path fireball that flowed at 23:13 on November 10, 2020. It rushed in at a speed of 66km / s and a plunge angle of 16 degrees, and flowed between Tochigi and Fukushima prefectures. Since the vanishing point altitude is about 78km, it seems that it has burned out. It was a fireball with an aphelion near the orbit of Jupiter.

It looks like a long-path fireball that flowed at 18:31 on November 9, 2020 was seen with a wide-angle camera from Fuji to the southwestern sky. The rush speed was as low as 19km / s, so it flowed slowly for nearly 6 seconds. The northern meteor shower in Taurus has reached its peak, but it was a fireball of scattered meteors.


 
A bright fireball flowed tonight as well! It looks like the fireball that flowed at 23:00 on November 11, 2020 was seen with a wide-angle camera from his home in Hiratsuka toward the southern sky. It flowed slowly for nearly 4 seconds.
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It looks like the fireball that flowed at 23:00 on November 11, 2020 was seen with a wide-angle camera from Fuji's parents' house to the southern sky. Fuji was sunny.

A comparatively bright composite image, ground path, and orbit of the fireball that flowed at 23:00 on November 11, 2020. It rushed at a speed of 15km / s and a plunge angle of 54 degrees, and flowed east of Miyakejima. It was a fireball of scattered meteors from the asteroid belt.


A couple of hours ago, the near-Earth asteroid 2020 VP1 had a extremely close, but safe, approach with our planet, reaching a minimum distance from the Earth of about 184000 km, 0.48 times the average distance of the Moon. We imaged it last night, contributing to compute its orbit.

The image above comes from a single, 300-seconds exposure, remotely taken with the “Elena” (PlaneWave 17″+Paramount ME+SBIG STL-6303E) robotic unit available at Virtual Telescope. The telescope tracked the fast apparent motion of the asteroid, this is why stars show as long trails, while the asteroid looks like a bright and sharp dot of light in the center of the image, marked by an arrow.

At the imaging time, asteroid 2020 VP1 was at about 830000 km from the Earth and approaching us. It was discovered by the Catalina Sky Survey on 10 Nov. 2020. As you can see from the MPEC 2020-V67 Circular, our observations (470 Ceccano) done while the asteroid was waiting for confirmation contributed to the the computation of its orbit.

This 7.9 – 18 meters large asteroid reached its minimum distance (about 184000 km) from us on 11 Nov. 2020,
at 06:594 UTC (source: Nasa/JPL). Of course, there were no risks at all for our planet.

Location Hartford US Nov 10, 2020
Geo Loc 41.7552° / -72.7469° Elevation 39.4197m

The Leonid meteor shower 2020 reaches peak activity on 17 November at 11:00 UT. This peak time is in daylight, but there are also some interesting predictions for dust trail crossings at periods that will be in darkness for UK viewing.

Leonid meteors can typically be seen between 10–20 November. They are fast meteors, associated with the debris stream of comet 55P/Tempel-Tuttle.

The radiant – the point in the sky from which the meteors appear to emanate – is in the curved portion of the Sickle asterism in Leo, the pattern that is meant to represent the Lion’s head (see illustration below).

For more guides on seeing shooting stars, visit our dedicated meteor shower page, read our beginner’s guide to meteor showers or find out how to observe and record shooting stars.
 
Asteroid 2020 VT4 makes extremely close approach to Earth at just 0.02 LD - breaks record for the closest asteroid flyby

A newly-discovered asteroid designated 2020 VT4 flew past Earth at a very close distance of just 0.02 LD / 0.0000451 AU (6 746 km / 4 192 miles) at 17:20 UTC on November 13, 2020. This makes it the closest known asteroid to flyby Earth, surpassing 2020 QG which flew past us on August 16, 2020, at 0.0000623 AU.1605505227485.png
2020 VT4 is the 91st known asteroid to flyby Earth within 1 lunar distance since the start of the year and the 6th so far this month.

The object was first observed at ATLAS-MLO, Mauna Loa, Hawaii on November 14, one day after its close approach.

It belongs to the Apollo group of asteroids and has an estimated diameter between 4.8 and 11 m (16 - 36 feet).

2020 VT4 flew past us at a speed (relative to the Earth) of 13.42 km/s.
 
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