Giant asteroid '1998 OR 2' to safely skip Earth on April 29: NASA

New Delhi : A giant asteroid, several times large than Mt. Everest, is believed to be moving towards Earth; while many presumed that it will end up hitting our planet, the NASA has confirmed that it will safely skip our planet; however, the US space agency has tagged it as "potentially hazardous".

As per NASA, if an asteroid orbit ever intersects earth's orbit at a distance less than 4.6 million miles (7.5 million km), or 0.05 astronomical units, the average distance between the earth and the sun then it qualifies to be called as "potentially hazardous".

The US space agency has also ensured people that there is no urgent need to be panic as the asteroid, which has been named 1998 OR 2, will pass about 64 lakh km away from the earth.

This distance is not considered much in space science but it is a good distance from earth.

A similar situation appeared in 1908 when scientists were expecting of a meteorite collision in the atmosphere of Siberia. However, that meteorite was small in size and it was burnt while it was entering the atmosphere of the earth.

About Asteroid '1998 OR 2'

According to NASA scientists, this time the asteroid is moving rapidly towards the Earth. Its size is quite large. Therefore, the damage was expected to be high, but according to the calculation, the asteroid would pass several kilometres away from the earth.

This asteroid has been named 52768 (1998 OR 2). This asteroid was first seen by NASA in 1998. It will pass by the Earth on April 29, 2020.

This asteroid takes 1,340 days or 3.7 years to complete one orbit of the sun. This asteroid is coming towards the Earth at a speed of 31,319 km per hour.