Asteroid Flyby: Pictures Emerge Of A 4KM Asteroid Poised To Pass Earth In April Asteroid Flyby
whizz by from a distance of about by 3.9 million miles (6.29 million km).
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Astrophysicist Gianluca Masi from the Virtual Telescope Project in Italy has already managed to photograph the asteroid.
Dr Masi snapped the [MAP]
Asteroid flyby: Some space rocks make 'close approaches' to the planet (Image: EXPRESS)
Asteroid flyby: The asteroid was snapped from almost 19 million miles away (Image: GIANLUCA MASI/VIRTUAL TELESCOPE)
The asteroid will be closest to Earth on the morning of April 29.
NASA's orbital calculations suggest the closest approach of about 16.36 lunar distances (LD) will occur at 10.56am BST (9.56am UTC, 4.56am EST).
The space agency estimates the rock is flying through space at speeds of about 8.7km per second or 19,461mph (31,320kmh).
The asteroid is also estimated to measure in the range of 1.1 miles to 2.54 miles (1.5km to 4.1km) in diameter.
Dr Masi snapped his pictures of the asteroid on March 16.
The pictures were taken with a robotic telescope dubbed Elena, over 10 180-second exposures.
Dr Masi said: "The image on the top shows the asteroid like a dot of light, with the stars leaving short trails on the background.
"In that case we aligned the frames used to create the final image considering the motion of the asteroid, slowly moving across the sky.
"The image on the bottom was, more ordinarily, aligned on the stars, so only the asteroid is trailing, while all the stars around are perfectly tracked."
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