The largest “potentially dangerous” asteroid of recent years has been detected  

Belongs to the category of “planetary destroyers”

Astronomers have discovered three new asteroids, one of which is “potentially hazardous” and the largest we’ve spotted in eight years. It has a diameter of 1.5 kilometers and is on an orbit that may in the future bring it close enough to Earth to pose a threat.

The orbit of the other two asteroids is much safer, since it brings them closer to the Sun than to Earth.

So far we have found two large “potentially hazardous” asteroids that are larger than one kilometer in size, a size we call “planet destroyers”. There are probably very few asteroids of this size left to find, and they probably have orbits that keep them inside the orbits of Earth and Venus. Only 25 asteroids with orbits that coincide with Earth’s have been discovered to date, due to our difficulty observing objects in front of the Sun’s glare.

There are more than 2,000 “potentially hazardous” asteroids that we have already identified. If we know their existence, we can model their trajectories and calculate if and when they will come within dangerous distance of Earth. The sooner we know this information, the better we can prepare and send a ship to collide with them to change their course.

The research was published in The Astronomical Journal .