World Asteroid Day aims to raise public awareness about the asteroid impact hazard and to inform the public about the crisis communication actions to be taken at the global level in case of a credible near-Earth object (NOEs) catastrophic threat.
World Asteroid Day is an annual global event which is held on June 30, the anniversary of the Tunguska event in 1908 when a meteor air burst decimated about 2,000 square km (500,000 acres) of pine forest in central Siberia, Russia. The Tunguska asteroid event was the Earth's largest asteroid impact in recorded history.
World Asteroid Day: History
The Asteroid Day was cofounded in 2014 (the year after the 2013 Chelyabinsk meteor air burst) by renowned cosmologist Stephen Hawking, Apollo 9 astronaut Rusty Schweickart, astrophysicist Brian May and some others. On 15 February 2013, an extraordinarily large fireball, travelling at a speed of 18.6 kms per second, entered the atmosphere and disintegrated in the skies over Chelyabinsk, Russia. According to NASA, the diameter of the asteroid was estimated at 18 meters and it’s mass at 11,000 tons. The total impact energy of the Chelyabinsk Fireball was 440 kilotons.
In December 2016 the United Nations General Assembly adopted resolution declaring 30 June as Word Asteroid Day. The event aims to raise awareness about asteroids and what can be done to protect the Earth, its families, communities, and future generations from a catastrophic event.
What are Asteroids?
Asteroids are small, rocky objects that orbit the Sun. They are left over from the formation of our solar system approximately 46 billion years ago. Although, they orbit the Sun like planets, but are much smaller than the planets. No two asteroids are alike. They have jagged and irregular shapes. Most of the asteroids are made of different kinds of rocks, but some have clays or metals, such as nickel and iron. There are lots of asteroids in our solar system. Most of them live in the main asteroid belt—a region between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter.
International Asteroid Day 2023: Significance
This day serves as a reminder of the devastating impact asteroids can have on Earth and highlights the incident of the 1908 Tunguska event and the Chelyabinsk event of 2013 in recorded history. The catastrophic impact of an asteroid on earth can understand from the fact that around 65 million years ago a chain reaction started by an asteroid impact led to the extinction of the dinosaurs and affected all life on Earth. It is also an ideal day to think of measures to save the planet from the hazardous effects of asteroids.
Since asteroids formed at the same time as other objects in our solar system, these space rocks can give scientists lots of information about the history of planets and the sun. Scientists can learn about asteroids by studying meteorites: tiny bits of asteroids that have flown through our atmosphere and landed on Earth’s surface.
