We can all breathe a sigh of relief. A 100-foot wide asteroid whizzed by the Earth on Monday night and (obviously) avoided a collision with our fair planet. Asteroid 2013 TX68 made its closest approach to Earth at about 7 p.m. ET Monday, according to Laurie Cantillo, a spokeswoman for NASA. NASA originally said the yacht-sized asteroid would fly by on March 5, but additional data allowed NASA’s Center for Near-Earth Object Studies Propulsion Laboratory (CNEOS) to “get a better handle on its orbital path” and predict that it would pass on March 8.

NASA was also able to determine last month that the asteroid would likely be 3 million miles away (about 379 times the Earth’s diameter) when it flew past Earth — but said the giant space rock could come as close as 15,000 miles (less than two times the Earth’s diameter). READ MORE


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