NASA confirms 1,000-foot-wide 'God of Destruction' asteroid will approach Earth

By the end of the decade an asteroid that measures approximately 1,000-foot-wide will approach Earth, and this asteroid has been named after the Egyptian god of chaos and destruction.

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The closest approach of the asteroid called Apophis will occur on April 13, 2029, and due to its incredible size and close proximity to Earth, a safe but extremely close 30,000 miles, skywatchers will be able to observe the asteroid with the naked eye. Apophis has been at the top of the European Space Agency's (ESA's) "impact risk list" of potentially hazardous asteroids (PHAs) and NASA's Sentry Risk Table for 17 years, but further analysis by NASA determined it won't hit Earth for at least the next 100 years.

So, what's the big deal? NASA plans on using the close approach of Apophis as an opportunity to learn more about near-Earth asteroids, and space rocks in general, as Apophis formed around the same time the as the planets, making its material extremely valuable to researchers that want to piece together the long evolution of the solar system.

NASA plans to send spacecrafts to the asteroid as it approaches Earth, with one concept being a small asteroid that will enter the orbit of Apophis and stay with it for weeks as it flies toward Earth. The challenges of this particular concept are the craft would need to function autonomously for long periods of time and the distance it would be required to travel.