Scientists who study earth-threatening asteroids say our neighbor Venus may be hiding some of the really dangerous space rocks. They orbit in the same orbit as it and are extremely difficult to observe.
Venus and asteroids
Twenty years ago, the U.S. Senate tasked NASA scientists with identifying 90% of all asteroids dangerous to Earth. Since then, scientists have discovered a bunch of objects that could potentially pose a threat to our planet, but have never come close to finally accomplishing the task.
Dangerous asteroids are indeed extremely numerous and some of them, as scientists have recently found, are hiding thanks to Venus. A recently published paper looks at those orbiting the same orbit as our nearest neighbor.
In total, about 20 such bodies are known. Orbital mechanics do not prohibit their existence until their paths cross with Venus itself. So, theoretically, they can stay in their orbits indefinitely.
However, they still remain potentially hazardous to the Earth. After all, all bodies with a diameter of more than 140 m that approach us closer than 0.05 a.u. fall into this category.
Danger
It might be said that all of this is just a formality caused by an overly cautious approach to determining which asteroids are dangerous and which are not. But in fact some danger from asteroids co-orbiting Venus remains.
In fact, their orbits may actually experience strong oscillations and change at some point. And these changes may be quite small, but will still cause these space rocks to fly close to Earth.
And worst of all, scientists can’t even accurately estimate how stable the orbits of these asteroids are. Because due to their proximity to the Sun, observing time is extremely limited. In addition, inside the orbit of our neighbor rotates many more bodies, which are also almost impossible to observe.
Therefore, no one can really say for sure how many dangerous asteroids there actually are out there. Experts are very much counting on the Vera Rubin Observatory’s large telescope, which should start operating as early as July 2025.
According to phys.org
