Potentially Hazardous Asteroid (7335) 1989 JA close encounter: a image – 27 Apr. 2022
While waiting for its safe, relatively close approach next 27 May 2022, we imaged again the large (1.8 km in diameter) potentially hazardous asteroid (7335) 1989 JA. Here it is our image.
The image above comes from the average of two, 300-second exposures, remotely taken with the “Elena” (PlaneWave 17″+Paramount ME+SBIG STL-6303E) robotic unit available at Virtual Telescope. The telescope tracked the apparent motion of the asteroid, which was very slow at the moment.
At the imaging time, asteroid (7335) 1989 JA was at about 35.6 millions of km from the Earth and it was slowly approaching us. It was discovered by Eleanor Helin, from Palomar Observatory, on 1 May 1989.
This 1.8 km large asteroid will reach its minimum distance (about 4 millions of km, almost 10.5 times the average lunar distance) from us on 27 May 2022, at 14:26 UTC (source: Nasa/JPL). Of course, there are no risks at all for our planet. We are trying to plan a live coverage of the fly-by from the Southern Hemisphere.
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