Monday, January 26, asteroid 2004 BL86 flew past Earth at the short distance of 1.2 million kilometers (over 745,500 miles), at the closest point of its trajectory. That's just over 3 times the distance from Earth to the Moon!
2004 BL86 measures approximately 0.5 km (1/3 of a mile) in size, and is the closest asteroid flyby forecast until 2027. This is the closest Earth will come to this particular asteroid for the next 200 years, and the event offered a unique opportunity to study an asteroid at (relatively) close range (Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech).
