As a planet in the universe, it is very common to be hit by other asteroids.
If you look at other stars around us, you will know that whether it is the moon or Mars, there are a large number of craters on it, which are the traces left by the impact. Of course, compared with other surrounding stars, the frequency of impacts on the Earth is still relatively low, and there are about 200 craters that have been found on the earth's surface, thanks to the protection of Jupiter, a gas giant planet, and a huge moon of the moon. But then again, although slightly larger asteroids rarely visit Earth, smaller guys still come every day, roughly calculated, at least 1 ton of asteroids will crash into the Earth every day, but these guys are too small, so they have disappeared in friction with the atmosphere before they fall to the ground.
Although there are many asteroids that fall to the earth every day, most of them are difficult to find, and even because they are too small to even rub a trace of fire in the sky.
So are there any asteroids that were discovered before they crashed into Earth? Of course. Humans have been monitoring the trajectory of asteroids for many years, but due to the limitations of the level of observation technology, there has been no way to deal with guys who are too small, but this situation has changed in recent years. Since 2008, humans have actually found five times before the impact of the asteroid tracks, and the most recent one occurred on March 11, 2022, when the asteroid was observed by astronomers two hours before it officially fell into Earth's atmosphere.
The first person to discover the asteroid that had come to offend Earth was the astronomer Krisztian.
Krisztian was making astronomical observations using the 60-centimeter Schmidt Telescope at the Hungarian Observatory, and he stumbled upon a fast-moving and very bright object from the telescope, no doubt a new object. With a wealth of experience, Krisztian sent his observations to the Minor Planet Center just 14 minutes later. Subsequently, automated impact assessment systems around the world immediately assessed the asteroid's impact potential, and the initial assessment showed that the asteroid had less than 1% chance of hitting Earth. Although it didn't seem like it was going to hit Earth, it was an interesting discovery after all, so Krisztian continued to observe and sent subsequent observations to the minor planet center again.
Krisztian first discovered the asteroid at 19:24, and more than an hour later, at 20:25, the ESA's NEAR-Earth Object Coordination Center triggered the alarm.
The alarm was triggered by the assessment of the ESA's "Meerkat" detection system based on accumulated observational data, and the probability of the asteroid hitting the Earth had increased to 100% at this time. Yes, in just one hour, the probability of an impact rises from 1% to 100%, and there are predictions about when the impact will occur and where the impact will end up. According to the predictions, the asteroid will crash into the Earth within an hour, between 21:21 and 21:25 on that day, hundreds of kilometers north of Iceland.
Of course, the asteroid is not only observed by Krisztian and ESA, many observatories around the world have observed the asteroid.
If you're an astronomer, March 11 is definitely a carnival day, because both professional astronomical observatories and amateur astronomers have begun to look for and observe the asteroid, but it is not so easy to find it. By the time ESA triggered the alarm, the asteroid was already very close to Earth, about one-seventh of the earth-moon distance, and it was moving very fast, so it was not easy to find, and many astronomy enthusiasts did not see it in the end. But for professional astronomical observatories, it's not hard to find, because they can aggregate observations from around the world to determine the asteroid's position.
The asteroid eventually fell into Earth's atmosphere at 21:22:42, just 140 kilometers south of Jan Mayen Island, and the asteroid was officially named "2022 EB5" after the impact.
What was the impact of this impact? It doesn't have any effect, because the asteroid is only about 1 meter in diameter, and an asteroid of this size will basically burn out in friction with the Earth's atmosphere. The discovery of 2022 EB5, although not meaningful, shows us a positive signal, asteroids with a diameter of only 1 meter, which we can now observe in advance 2 hours before the impact, and large asteroids are easier to detect, especially those that can affect the Earth, and now we can monitor them for a long time, which means that we can prevent asteroid impacts in advance in the future, or reduce the harm caused by impacts.