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Elongated Asteroid Will Safely Pass Earth on Christmas Eve

Dec. 23, 2015
The elongated asteroid in this radar image, named 2003 SD220, will safely fly past Earth on Dec. 24, 2015, at a distance of 6.8 million miles (11 million kilometers).

The elongated asteroid in this radar image, named 2003 SD220, will safely fly past Earth on Thursday, Dec. 24, 2015, at a distance of 6.8 million miles (11 million kilometers). The image was taken on Dec. 22 by scientists using NASA's 230-foot (70-meter) Deep Space Network antenna at Goldstone, California, when the asteroid was approaching its flyby distance.

This asteroid is at least 3,600 feet (1,100 meters) long. In 2018, it will safely pass Earth at a distance of 1.8 million miles (2.8 million kilometers).

More information about asteroids and near-Earth objects is at http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/asteroidwatch. More information about asteroid radar research is at http://echo.jpl.nasa.gov/.

More information about the Deep Space Network is at http://deepspace.jpl.nasa.gov/dsn.

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