NASA announces a meteorite image

On June 16, the US Space Agency (NASA) announced images of a giant meteorite, nicknamed 'monster', flying over Earth at a relatively close distance.

The 2014 HQ124 meteorite flew over Earth at a distance of 1.25 million km on June 8, but did not cause any effect. Two scientists Marina Brozovic and Lance Benner at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in California (USA) used radar observation stations to record 21 clear images of this meteorite over 4 hours.

Images of the 2014 meteorite HQ124 published by NASA on June 16.(Photo: icyscience.com)

Mr. Lance Benner said that the 2014 meteorite HQ124 seems to be an elongated object with a size of about 370m. With this length, scientists believe that the meteorite dubbed the 'monster' can cause an explosion that can destroy millions of tons and wipe out a city, if it plunges to Earth.

'This could be a double meteorite, consisting of two celestial bodies that form an asteroid with an elongated shape , ' said astronomer Lance Benner.

Astronomers began to care about the 2014 HQ124 meteorite, discovered from April 23, before it flew over Earth at the nearest distance on June 8 last. Meteors have a flying speed in space of 50,400km / hour.

'HQ124 is at least 10 times larger and maybe 20 times more than a meteorite, causing thousands of people to be injured last year in Chelyabinsk, Siberia, Russia,' said astronomer Bob Berman of the Slooh Space Telescope Center. said. 'If it collides with our planet, the energy emitted will not be the same as the atomic bombs used in the end of World War II, which is equivalent to the millions of tons of H bombs'.