Getting your player ready...
PASADENA, Calif. — An asteroid about the size of one that leveled more than 800 square miles of forest in Siberia a century ago just buzzed the Earth.
The asteroid, named 2009 DD45, was about 48,800 miles from Earth when it zipped past early Monday, NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory reported. That is just twice as high as the orbits of some telecommunications satellites and about a fifth of the distance to the moon. The space rock measured between 69 feet and 154 feet in diameter.
Scientists at the Siding Spring Observatory in Australia spotted 2009 DD45 and began tracking it late last month. But they knew within an hour that it wouldn’t pose a threat.
