Although we might some pray for an asteroid strike to wipe us all out for different reasons, it hasn't happened just yet - but it's been pretty gosh darn close.

This Sunday saw the 17th known near-miss from an asteroid recorded by NASA and other astronomers; a seven-meter wide asteroid which was newly discovered and flew within 79,000 miles of Earth on Sunday night / Monday morning at a relative Earth speed of 540 kilometers an hour. The asteroid, known as 2017 HV2, was far enough away that it doesn't pose a threat, but it's interesting to note just how common these asteroid strikes are.

According to amateur astronomy site The Watchers, there's been seventeen asteroids that have passed within one lunar distance of Earth since the start of the year. In other words, 17 asteroids have been closer to the Earth than the moon since January. On Wednesday of last week, an asteroid roughly twice the size of the Empire State Building in New York came within 1.1 million miles of Earth.

That may seem like a lot, and obviously the asteroid didn't come near enough to Earth to trigger the apocalypse, but it does point out the fact that there's plenty more things in space that could destroy us all than some fat bastard with a bad hairdo.

 

Via The Watchers