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How to watch 2023 BU? Truck-sized asteroid to make 'extraordinarily close approach' to Earth

NASA scientists stumbled upon the space rock, named '2023 BU', only on January 21, and it will reportedly pass by Earth at about 7.30 pm ET

WASHINGTON, DC: An asteroid the size of a delivery truck is expected to fly within 2,100 miles of our planet Thursday night, January 26, making it the fourth closest approach to Earth to date. NASA scientists stumbled upon the space rock, named '2023 BU', only on Saturday, January 21, and it will reportedly pass by Earth at about 7.30 pm ET.

The celestial body is expected to race past our planet at 33,000 mph. The Virtual Telescope Project (VTP) in Italy is reportedly hosting a live stream of the event slated to commence at 2.15 pm ET, ensuring those who do not have a telescope can also witness the phenomenon.

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According to the Daily Mail, 2023 BU is too small to be noticed by the naked eye, shining at a maximum of 11.3 magnitudes. The rock reportedly measures about 12.4 by 27.8 feet, which is about the size of a delivery truck or the original Routemaster London bus. Thus, it requires large, powerful telescopes to view, such as the VTP's 14-inch and 17-inch robotic ones in Ceccano. Astronomer Jonathan McDowell said the "asteroidlet" was within the orbit of the moon on Friday, January 20. Space experts, however, calculated 2023 BU's orbit and concluded there was no chance it was hitting Earth during this approach. According to NASA, asteroids smaller than 82 feet across usually burn up after entering the Earth's dense atmosphere. 

NASA’s Scout impact hazard assessment system confirmed that 2023 BU would miss our planet. "Scout quickly ruled out 2023 BU as an impactor, but despite the very few observations, it was nonetheless able to predict that the asteroid would make an extraordinarily close approach with Earth," Davide Farnocchia, a navigation engineer at the agency's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena who developed Scout, said in a statement. "In fact, this is one of the closest approaches by a known near-Earth object ever recorded," he added.

The asteroid will technically pass through the "exosphere" -- the uppermost region of our planet's atmosphere which extends from about 6,000 miles to 120,000 miles above the surface. Astronomers, however, do not consider this region to be an actual part of the atmosphere considering the air is so thin. That said, 2023 BU will pass within the orbit of geostationary satellites above South America, but will be quite a distance from the International Space Station which is 250 miles from Earth.

According to NASA's Center for Near Earth Object Studies (CNEOS), which manages the Scout system, this will be the fourth closest pass of our planet out of over 35,000 past and future approaches. However, while most asteroids pass beyond the distance of the moon, which is 240,000 miles away, 2023 BU is a lot closer. CNEOS currently has asteroid data covering a period of 300 years from 1900 to 2200. It's worth noting that the latest space rock was discovered by famed astronomer Gennadiy Borisov at the Crimean Astrophysical Observatory in Nauchnyi, Crimea on January 21. Borisov is credited with spotting the first comet ever seen that had made its way into the solar system from outer space, called 2I/Borisov.

NASA revealed that 2023 BU currently orbits the sun every 359 days and its revolutionary path occasionally intersects Earth's orbital trajectory. The space agency said the asteroid's proximity to our planet during Thursday night's rendezvous will cause Earth's gravity to lengthen its orbit to 425 days and make its path more elongated. The rock will next pass us on December 6, 2036, though it will be well beyond the orbit of the moon on that occasion.