Skull-shaped asteroid will haunt Earth in 2018

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Credit: Artist impression of TB145 (J. A. Peñas/SINC)

An asteroid called 2015 TB145 will pay us a visit next year. This object has very strange shapes. It really resembles a human skull!

 

2015 TB145 is a relatively small Solar System asteroid. On 31 October, 2015; the skull-shaped heavenly body buzzed by Earth just outside the Moon's orbit, at 486,000 kilometres (302,000 miles). Astrophysicist Pablo Santos-Sanz from the Institute of Astrophysics of Andalusia said that the object measures between 625 metres and 700 metres, its shape is a slightly flattened ellipsoid, and its rotation axis was roughly perpendicular to the Earth at the time of its closest proximity. 

But in early November 2018, 2015 TB145 will pay us a second visit. This time the asteroid will fly by Earth at a relatively long distance - around 105 times the distance between Earth and the Moon, so we can feel safe. Astronomers have never seen the asteroid with such unusual shapes.

 

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