- 6 weeks ago
🚀 Astronomers just spotted 100 brand-new asteroids, and some of them are cruising uncomfortably close to Earth. Most space rocks fly by without drama, but a few of these have paths that make scientists pay extra attention. The scary part is that many asteroids stay invisible until they’re already nearby. In this video, we break down how these objects get detected, how risky they really are, and what would happen if one didn’t miss. Don’t miss this video if you want to know how safe Earth actually is right now. Animation is created by Bright Side.
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This video is made for entertainment purposes. We do not make any warranties about the completeness, safety and reliability. Any action you take upon the information in this video is strictly at your own risk, and we will not be liable for any damages or losses. It is the viewer's responsibility to use judgement, care and precaution if you plan to replicate.
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Music from TheSoul Sound: https://thesoul-sound.com/
Check our Bright Side podcast on Spotify and leave a positive review! https://open.spotify.com/show/0hUkPxD34jRLrMrJux4VxV
Subscribe to Bright Side: https://goo.gl/rQTJZz
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Our Social Media:
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https://www.eastnews.ru
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For more videos and articles visit: http://www.brightside.me
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This video is made for entertainment purposes. We do not make any warranties about the completeness, safety and reliability. Any action you take upon the information in this video is strictly at your own risk, and we will not be liable for any damages or losses. It is the viewer's responsibility to use judgement, care and precaution if you plan to replicate.
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FunTranscript
00:00So, how do you feel about cooking?
00:03Nah, pasta and burgers are overrated.
00:05How about something more exotic?
00:07Or rather, more cosmic?
00:09So, the recipe is simple.
00:11Take a team of enthusiastic astronomers
00:13and add some old images from the James Webb Space Telescope.
00:17Stir really well, and you'll get a shocking number of tiny asteroids
00:21in the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter.
00:24Yummy!
00:25The highlight of this dish is the direction in which some of the asteroids are moving.
00:30Because, in their way, there's our poor planet.
00:33Are we doomed just because you decided to cook?
00:36Now, the asteroids I'm talking about are much smaller
00:39than the massive space rock that wiped out the dinosaurs.
00:42But they can still cause considerable damage.
00:46They range in size from as small as a bus to as big as a stadium.
00:50But even those small ones pack quite a punch.
00:53Let's look at a recent dramatic example.
00:55It happened on February 15, 2013.
00:58A small asteroid just tens of feet wide exploded in an airburst over Chelyabinsk in Siberia,
01:05releasing an insane amount of energy.
01:08Many people witnessed and recorded the event, and it gave scientists vital clues.
01:13New computer models helped scientists reconstruct the size, speed, and impact of the Chelyabinsk meteor.
01:19It was likely an asteroid, about the size of a five-story building,
01:23exploding from 15 to 18 miles above Earth's surface with an enormous, incomparable force.
01:30The blast shattered a million windows and hurt over a thousand people.
01:34Fortunately, it wasn't powerful enough to cause too much damage.
01:38But it gave us an idea about how dangerous an airburst can be.
01:42Now, an airburst occurs when an object explodes high in the atmosphere,
01:47never striking the ground, but releasing enough energy to devastate the area.
01:52But back to the small asteroids.
01:55The most dangerous thing about them is that they hit the Earth far more often than the larger ones,
02:00about 10,000 times more frequently.
02:02To make matters worse, their small size makes them harder to detect in advance,
02:07leaving little time for preparation if one is heading towards Earth.
02:11Now, let's travel back in time.
02:14Uh-oh, dinosaurs! Too far back.
02:16Ah, there we go!
02:18A team of astronomers is working on a special method to find small asteroids and telescope images
02:24that were originally taken to study distant stars.
02:27Using this method, they've looked through thousands of JWST images of a star system called TRAPPIST-1.
02:34It's located 40 light-years away and is one of the most studied systems outside our solar system.
02:40Now, while analyzing these images, they discovered 138 new asteroids in the main asteroid belt,
02:47plus 8 they already knew about.
02:49And guess what?
02:50Among the newly found asteroids, 6 seem to have been pushed into paths that could bring them closer to Earth.
02:57Who did it?
02:58Well, probably nearby planets.
03:00Are they holding a grudge against Earth?
03:02Interestingly, scientists thought they'd find just a few new asteroids, but the number was much higher than they expected.
03:10Yet, it's no wonder.
03:12Right now, they're exploring a part of space they didn't know much about before.
03:16Now, let's talk about the hero of the day, the James Webb Space Telescope.
03:21It's especially good at finding small asteroids, because it can detect their heat.
03:26These asteroids give off infrared radiation, which is much easier to see than the faint sunlight that reflects off their surfaces.
03:33This technology allowed scientists to spot the smallest asteroids ever seen in the main asteroid belt.
03:39The asteroids they found are pieces left over from collisions between bigger space rocks.
03:45Finding them helps astronomers understand the history of the asteroid belt
03:49and improve methods for tracking small asteroids that could threaten Earth.
03:53The researchers are planning to use James Webb to observe other star systems for at least 500 hours.
04:01They expect this work to uncover thousands more small asteroids in the solar system.
04:05Other advanced telescopes, like the Vera C. Rubin Observatory in Chile, will also help.
04:11Starting in 2025, this observatory will use the world's largest digital camera
04:16to photograph the southern sky every night for at least 10 years.
04:20Each image will cover a huge area of the sky, about 40 times the size of the full moon.
04:27The observatory might find up to 2.5 million asteroids in just 6 months,
04:31almost doubling the number we know about.
04:36Recently, NASA has identified two small asteroids.
04:39They were supposed to pass near Earth on December 16, 2024.
04:44Luckily, neither posed any danger to our planet.
04:46The first asteroid was 71 feet wide, about the size of a large airplane,
04:52and was traveling at 10,800 miles per hour.
04:55The second asteroid was slightly smaller, 56 feet wide.
04:59But it traveled faster, at 14,700 miles per hour.
05:03But hey, even though this time the danger has passed,
05:06who knows what the future will bring.
05:09It may sound weird these days,
05:12But astronomers didn't really care much about small asteroids for a rather long time.
05:17They thought of them as just random space debris that got in the way of observing stars.
05:22Some even called them sky parasites.
05:25But now, the way we see these little space rocks has completely changed.
05:30You see, until recently, we could only spot really big asteroids, those over a mile wide.
05:36The smaller ones just blended into the background noise and telescope images.
05:40But then, a clever trick appeared where multiple images of the same part of the sky were combined,
05:47making those faint small objects finally stand out.
05:50The data from certain telescopes, along with the James Webb Space Telescope,
05:55helps us improve planetary defense.
05:57But there's more to it than just protecting our planet.
06:01Studying these small asteroids also teaches us about how the solar system evolved.
06:06There are so many of them because they're fragments from collisions between bigger space rocks.
06:11One researcher has said this is like looking at old data in a new way.
06:16These small asteroids, which people used to think of as space junk,
06:20are crucial for understanding our solar system and even preparing for whatever the future holds.
06:26Among those hundreds of millions of rocks orbiting the sun in the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter,
06:32some are especially worrisome.
06:34They come close enough to Earth for it to be quite concerning.
06:38NASA classifies asteroids that orbit within 30 million miles of our planet as near-Earth objects,
06:45and those could pose a serious threat if they were to collide with our planet.
06:49Right now, NASA is closely monitoring an asteroid named Bennu.
06:54This is a fairly large space rock, measuring about 1,600 feet across.
06:58It could, potentially, crash into Earth in 159 years.
07:03First, the astronauts spotted it in 1999.
07:07So currently, experts believe that there's a small chance Bennu could drift into Earth's orbit
07:12and collide with our planet by September 24, 2182.
07:16Would it be bad?
07:19Well, to put it in perspective, Bennu is taller than the Empire State Building.
07:24If it hit Earth, it would generate 1,200 megatons of energy,
07:28an amount so massive that nothing on Earth could generate that.
07:33NASA scientists are particularly concerned about a tiny chance
07:37that Bennu could pass through a gravitational keyhole during the flyby in the 22nd century.
07:42This keyhole is a region in space that could set the asteroid on a path that brings it directly to Earth.
07:49Now, Bennu flies by Earth every six years and has had three close encounters with us
07:54in 1999, 2005, and 2011.
07:58Right now, scientists estimate that the chance of Bennu hitting Earth by 2182 is about 1 in 2,700,
08:06more than five times greater than the chance of being struck by lightning.
08:10Although the chances of Bennu colliding with Earth are very low right now,
08:15this space rock is still classified as a potentially hazardous asteroid
08:19because it might come as close as 4.65 million miles to Earth.
08:25Now, this asteroid is another space rock that we need to keep an eye on.
08:29It's a near-Earth object about 1,100 feet across, and it was discovered in 2004.
08:35Initially, it was considered one of the most dangerous asteroids ever detected.
08:40Apophis quickly gained attention because experts believed it could pose a serious threat to Earth
08:45because of its close approach to our planet in 2029.
08:49However, after further study of its orbit, astronomers determined that there was no risk of a collision
08:55for at least a century.
08:57Well, we can all breathe easier now, can't we?
09:00A mysterious space visitor has recently passed its closest approach to Earth,
09:07flying by at a distance of 64 million miles.
09:11It might be something totally natural and born on the outskirts of the solar system.
09:16Or some unknown civilization could be examining us from above right at this moment.
09:22This new object looks a lot like another strange wanderer called Three-Eye Atlas.
09:28And you'll understand why we say strange pretty soon.
09:32So, could both of them come from the same place outside our solar system?
09:37What we do know is that this new object is relatively close to us, in space terms, of course.
09:44And scientists are now studying it closely.
09:46They first spotted it inside our solar system.
09:49And people are paying attention because it showed up not long after Three-Eye Atlas passed near our sun.
09:56On November 2, 2025, astronomer Gennady Borisov, the same person who discovered interstellar comet 2I Borisov in 2019,
10:08found this new object.
10:10It's now got its official name and is listed in NASA's and the Minor Planet Center's databases.
10:17C-2025V1 has some unusual features.
10:21Its orbit is tilted 113 degrees, which means it's moving almost up and over the regular path that planets take.
10:30Even more bizarre, its orbital plane is almost at a right angle to the path of Three-Eye Atlas.
10:37Plus, it doesn't have a clear comet tail, which is odd.
10:41Right now, its orbit has an eccentricity of 1.0095.
10:47And let me break it down in human language.
10:50If that number was well above 1, it would mean the object definitely came from outside the solar system.
10:56But because it's only just a bit above 1, the most likely explanation is that C-2025V1 came from the Oort cloud.
11:07That's a giant, faraway shell of icy objects that surrounds the solar system.
11:12Now, scientists check this by basically rewinding the object's path, sending it all the way back to about 1,000 AU.
11:21That's 1,000 times farther than the Earth is from the Sun.
11:25At that huge distance, the planets can't mess with its motion anymore.
11:30When they redo the orbit from that point, its eccentricity, the number that tells you if it's from outside the solar system, usually drops below 1.
11:40Which means it's still part of our solar system.
11:43But at the same time, even a tiny push from Jupiter while passing by could make even a normal Oort cloud comet look like it has an eccentricity slightly above 1.
11:55And on top of that, small blasts of gas coming off the comet's surface can also change the numbers a little.
12:03So, to put it simply, it probably isn't interstellar.
12:07It just looks that way because of small pushes and gas bursts.
12:12C-2025V1 is still exciting, even if it comes from the Oort cloud.
12:17Because studying it gives us a chance to analyze the material from that distant region and learn how our solar system formed and evolved.
12:26Now, let's get back to the mystery of 3i Atlas.
12:30Before anything else, let's explain what 3i Atlas actually is.
12:34It's most likely a comet, basically a huge, dirty snowball flying through space.
12:40You can't see it with your own eyes or with a regular telescope.
12:43But there's good news.
12:46A powerful telescope in Italy is streaming it live for free.
12:50So, anyone can actually watch this mysterious object as it passes by.
12:55Scientists think this comet weighs about 33 billion tons.
13:00That number is hard to imagine, so here are a few comparisons.
13:04The Eiffel Tower weighs around 10,000 tons.
13:07So, 33 billion tons is the same as a whopping 3.3 million Eiffel Towers.
13:13And if you decide to compare the space visitor to buildings, 33 billion tons is about the same as the weight of several huge city areas made entirely of steel and concrete.
13:25But even all that size isn't the wildest part.
13:29Some experts think this object might be a piece of unknown technology from outside our galaxy.
13:35And they're not saying this just for fun.
13:37There are real reasons behind the theory.
13:40Three-Eye Atlas was first noticed in July by NASA's Asteroid Terrestrial Impact Last Alert System, or ATLAS.
13:50Shortly after, NASA confirmed that the object wasn't from our solar system at all.
13:56It's an interstellar object, only the third ever discovered.
13:59The first one was Oumuamua in 2017, which looked long and flat and didn't behave like a normal rock.
14:08The second was comet B.I. Borisov in 2019.
14:13Now we have 3I Atlas, and it is enormous compared with the other two.
14:18Its nucleus is up to 3.5 miles wide, while Oumuamua was only about a quarter mile long, and Borisov was around a half mile across.
14:28Besides being huge, 3I Atlas is unusual in several other ways.
14:34As it moves through the solar system, it's releasing massive amounts of carbon dioxide and gas.
14:40This suggests that 3I Atlas is 3 to 5 orders of magnitude, which means 1,000 to 100,000 times more massive than the other two known interstellar visitors.
14:52Such an enormous difference is a real scientific mystery.
14:57It's also traveling incredibly fast, about 150,000 miles per hour, which is almost 200 times the speed of sound.
15:06And unlike objects in our solar system, which followed curved paths because of gravity,
15:123I Atlas is moving on a nearly straight line.
15:16That alone makes it stand out.
15:18These odd behaviors have led some researchers to consider a pretty unexpected idea.
15:253I Atlas might be a probe sent by another civilization, possibly to study Earth.
15:31According to this theory, the object could be a sign of some kind of intelligence from beyond our solar system.
15:38Why do they think this?
15:40Well, because the object's movement doesn't match what you'd expect from something controlled only by gravity.
15:46It also passes close to Venus, Mars, and Jupiter.
15:51And these are the planets that might be especially interesting for an outside civilization to observe.
15:57Another very unusual feature of 3I Atlas's path is that its orbit is tilted only a little compared to the plane of the solar system,
16:07about 5 degrees, and it moves in the opposite direction to most planets.
16:12This feature might allow the object, or its creators, to take extremely precise measurements of planets,
16:20things like their orbits and sizes, to plan a perfect flight route through the solar system.
16:25And if 3I Atlas suddenly changes direction at some point,
16:30that could mean it's using a built-in engine instead of simply drifting through space.
16:35Now, new photos have also shown that 3I Atlas has at least 7 jets blasting material into space,
16:43some shooting in totally opposite directions.
16:46Now, if this thing is just a normal comet,
16:49it would have had to lose a huge amount of its original mass when it passed near the Sun,
16:55way more than just 10-20%.
16:57Only some of that material would actually push the object in one direction.
17:02So, the total amount blown off would need to be massive.
17:06If that's what happened, then there should be now a giant cloud of gas and dust around 3I Atlas.
17:13And if that cloud exists, it'll be pretty easy to figure out what the comet is made of.
17:18The James Webb Space Telescope will check this when 3I Atlas gets closest to Earth on December 19, 2025.
17:28But if 3I Atlas is not a normal comet and is actually some kind of technology,
17:34it wouldn't need to lose that much material.
17:37Engines built by an advanced civilization could give it a boost while using way less gas
17:43because they shoot it out way faster.
17:45Faster exhaust gives more push with less fuel.
17:49So, a technological object wouldn't need to blast away big chunks of itself the way a natural comet would.
17:56So, to sum it up, there's still a big mystery around 3I Atlas.
18:01Could it really be a technological mothership that released small probes into the inner solar system?
18:07But C-2025 V1 doesn't fit that idea,
18:12unless one of the objects used some kind of engine.
18:16The closest their orbits ever come is about 46 million miles.
18:20And the two objects themselves were never closer to each other than about 140 million miles.
18:27The tiny, non-gravitational push detected in 3I Atlas is nowhere near strong enough to close this gap.
18:34So, C-2025 V1 is almost certainly not one of the many probes people imagine 3I Atlas might have released.
18:44That's it for today.
18:45So, hey, if you pacified your curiosity, then give the video a like and share it with your friends.
18:50Or, if you want more, just click on these videos and stay on the bright side!
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