Giant asteroid to hurtle past Earth. An asteroid with a diameter of 400m will make its closest approach to Earth later this year.
Known as YU55, the asteroid would fly within the moon's orbit narrowly missing Earth, according to reports. "The space rock will hurtle past our planet at a distance of just 201,700 miles (324,600km) during its closest approach on November 8," The Daily Mail has reported. "That is closer to Earth than the moon, which orbits 238,857 miles (384,400km) away on average. "With a width of some 400m and weighing 55 million tons, YU55 will be the largest object to ever approach Earth. " Asteroid 2011 MD to Pass Extremely Close By Earth on Monday. UPDATE for 5:35 p.m.
ET: NASA has recalculated the time of closest approach for this event to be about 3 1/2 hours later than initially reported. The change is reflected below. Police dash cam of Meteor over Edmonton, Canada Italy Perseid Fireball 02.22.06 ± 1 U.T. 13AUG2011. Meteor lights up sky in South Africa NEO Earth Close Approaches. Apophis: The Asteroid That Could Smash Into The Earth.