A skyscraper-size asteroid was revealed in year-old telescope data thanks to a new algorithm that could rock the way near-Earth objects are discovered.
Astronomers have discovered a massive, skyscraper-size asteroid hiding in plain sight near Earth, thanks to a new algorithm designed to hunt the biggest, deadliest space rocks.
The asteroid made a close approach to Earth in September 2022, when it flew within about 4.5 million miles of our planet, according to NASA. Yet astronomers around the world failed to detect the asteroid in telescope data at any point before, during or after the approach, as the large rock was obscured by Milky Way starlight.
Now, researchers have finally revealed the space rock's existence while testing out a new algorithm that's tailor-made to detect large asteroids from small fragments of data. The detection of a PHA that's too sneaky for traditional methods to spot represents a huge vindication for the algorithm, which will soon be used to comb over data gathered by the Vera C.
To ensnare their first asteroid, the scientists put their algorithm to the test on archival data from the Asteroid Terrestrial-impact Last Alert System survey in Hawaii, which takes at least four images of the same spot of the sky every night. The search revealed something that ATLAS had missed: a large asteroid, visible in three separate sky images taken on Sept. 19, 2022, and the three following nights.
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