Asteroid 2026 JH2 Is About to Fly Right Past Earth—Relatively Speaking
May 16, 2026 5:00 AM
On May 18, an asteroid about the size of Chicago’s Cloud Gate will fly four times closer to Earth than the moon.
Photograph: buradaki/iStock/Getty Images Plus
look up! Asteroid 2026 JH2 is now approaching Earth; the object, which is about 20 meters (66 feet) in diameter—comparable to Chicago's Cloud Gate sculpture—will pass by on May 18. Enthusiasts will be able to observe it using a telescope or during a live broadcast organized by Virtual Telescope.
The object will pass at a minimum distance from Earth of about 57,000 miles—much closer than the moon, which is about four times farther away. Among the tracked near-earth objects, or NEOs, that will pass near the planet over the next few months, it will come the closest.
There are tens of thousands of NEOs, which are generally of no particular concern; they are, of course, monitored, and some...
Copyright of this story solely belongs to wired.com. To see the full text click HERE
