NASA boffins have warned skywatchers that a huge asteroid will pass over European and North American skies on Monday and that this will be the biggest space rock to do a fly-by of our planet until 2027. Most asteroids that pass us are smallish, between 50 and 100 meters wide. This latest visitor, asteroid 2004 BL86, is half a kilometer (0.3 miles) across, which would be very damaging if it hit Earth. Thankfully, there's no danger of that. The closest it will get is 1.2 million km (745,000 miles), or about three times the distance between our planet and the Moon. "Monday, January 26 will be the closest asteroid 2004 BL86 will get to Earth for at least the next 200 years," said Don Yeomans, manager of NASA's Near Earth Object Program Office at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory. "And while it poses no threat to Earth for the foreseeable future, it's a relatively close approach by a relatively large asteroid, so it provides us a unique opportunity to observe and learn more." Read more http://www.theregister.co.uk/2015/01/24/massive_asteroid_to_fly_past_earth_on_monday/
