A space rock, called the 2020 UF3, was shot down by Earth on October 22, allowing astronomers to photograph a passing planet. According to the Virtual Telescope Project, the storm flew at a distance of only 42,000 kilometers, which is about 11 percent of the distance between the Earth and the Moon.
NASA data show that the storm was flying at 22 kilometers per second or more than 79,000 kilometers per hour.
At that speed, the planet 2020 UF3 can orbit the Earth twice in just one hour.
The Virtual Telescope Project described it as the fastest planet ever seen by an astronomical group.
It said on its website: ‘Earth’s nearest straw 2020 UF3 came very close to our planet very safely, reached a minimum distance of about 42000 km from the earth, the distance to the moon is the true distance 11 Percent.
“It was moving very fast in the sky, setting a record for the virtual telescope facility.
“The image above comes from a single, 3 second (just three seconds!) Exposure, taken with the remote ‘Elena’ (Planewave 17 ″ + Paramount ME + SBIG STL-6303E) robotic unit available on a virtual telescope.
“At the time of the image above, the 2020 UF3 was at a minimum distance from our observatory (39600 km) and the telescope looked at a very fast rate of four times its angular size of 7000 ″ / min (2 degrees per minute). Lunar disk) Clear motion: This is the fastest planet we have ever seen.
“This 5.7 – 13 meter large planet was detected by a survey of Mount Lemon on October 21, 2020 and reached its minimum distance from Earth at 22:17 UTC on October 22, 2020.”
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NASA states: “NEOs are comets and stars that allow the gravitational pull of the surrounding planets to enter the Earth’s orbit.
“The scientific interest in comets and galaxies is largely due to the fact that about 6.6 billion years ago, the formation process of the solar system was relatively unchanged.
“The giant outer planets (Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune) are made up of billions of comets, and the remaining bits and pieces of this formation process are the comments we see today.
“Similarly, today’s galaxy contains bits and fragments left over from the initial cluster of inner planets, including Mercury, Venus, Earth, and Mars.”
