{"id":480631,"date":"2026-02-17T12:15:22","date_gmt":"2026-02-17T12:15:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/480631\/"},"modified":"2026-02-17T12:15:22","modified_gmt":"2026-02-17T12:15:22","slug":"potentially-hazardous-asteroid-162882-2001-fd58-close-encounter-an-image-15-feb-2026","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/480631\/","title":{"rendered":"Potentially Hazardous Asteroid (162882) 2001 FD58 close encounter: an image &#8211; 15 Feb. 2026."},"content":{"rendered":"<p>On 14 February 2026, the Potentially Hazardous Asteroid (162882) 2001 FD58 had a close encounter with the Earth, safely reaching a minimum distance from us of 6.5 millions of km, 17 times the average lunar distance. We imaged it the following night.<br \/>\n<a href=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/162882_2001FD58_E15feb2026_masi_pw17.jpg\"><img fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-206966\" class=\"wp-image-206966\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/162882_2001FD58_E15feb2026_masi_pw17.jpg\" alt=\"Potentially Hazardous Asteroid (162882) 2001 FD58: 15 Feb. 2026.\" width=\"800\" height=\"599\"  \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p id=\"caption-attachment-206966\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Potentially Hazardous Asteroid (162882) 2001 FD58: 15 Feb. 2026.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">The image above comes from a single, 120-second exposure, remotely taken with the \u201cElena\u201d (<a href=\"https:\/\/www.virtualtelescope.eu\/the-planevawe-17%E2%80%B3-f6-8-4322939-mm-corrected-dall-kirkham-astrograph-paramount-me-stl-6303e\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">PlaneWave 17\u2033 + Paramount MEII + SBIG STL-6303E<\/a>) \u00a0robotic unit\u00a0 available as part of the Virtual Telescope Project and installed in Manciano, Italy. The telescope tracked the apparent motion of the asteroid, so it looks like a bright and sharp dot of light, marked with a white arrow, while stars show as long trails.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">When we imaged it, potentially hazardous asteroid (162882) 2001 FD58 was at about 6.7 millions of km from us and already leaving, more than one day after its safe flyby.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">This 470 \u2013 1000 meters large asteroid reached its minimum distance (about 6.5 millions of km, 17 times the average lunar distance) from us on 14 Feb. 2026, at 14:11 UTC (source: Nasa\/JPL). Of course, there were no risks at all for our planet.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.virtualtelescope.eu\/solar-system\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Back to \u201cSolar System\u201d page<\/a><\/p>\n<p>Support The Virtual Telescope Project!<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">Support us! Please, donate and receive an EXCLUSIVE, image of the interstellar comet 3I\/ATLAS and many more pictures, specifically made for supporters like you!<br \/><a href=\"https:\/\/www.virtualtelescope.eu\/donate\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-205552 alignleft\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/Donatebutton.gif\" alt=\"\" width=\"100\" height=\"26\"\/><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"On 14 February 2026, the Potentially Hazardous Asteroid (162882) 2001 FD58 had a close encounter with the Earth,&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":480632,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[49,48,66],"class_list":["post-480631","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-science","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-science"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/480631","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=480631"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/480631\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/480632"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=480631"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=480631"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=480631"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}