Near Miss Day is celebrated on March 23rd of every year. The solar system consists of several planets, minor planets, satellites, and several smaller objects including comets, asteroids. Throughout history, several asteroids have crossed the Earth, and one such notable occurrence is the 4581 Asclepius which nearly missed hitting the earth. Imagine how it has been if that asteroid would have hit the planet. Of course, we would not have been there to commemorate the Near Miss Day. It is the day that reminds us of the day when a huge asteroid has missed hitting the Earth by a mere 500,000 miles.
“Sooner or later the space program will need to save us by detecting and deflecting an incoming asteroid.” – Nathan Myhrvold
History of Near Miss Day
The Near Miss Day’s origin and the creator are anonymous. There isn’t any record found of the year from when this Day has been in the celebration. However, the date is an annual reminder of the day when a massive asteroid named 4581 Asclepius nearly missed colliding with the Earth in the year 1989. As to reminisce this incident, the anonymous founder has come up with an idea to celebrate this occurrence with a Day. The asteroid passed by Earth on 22 March 1989 and was merely 500,000 miles away from the planet which was a very near miss indeed in interstellar terms. 4581 Asclepius, provisional designation 1989 FC is a 300-meter wide asteroid that flew past the Earth by a distance of 450,000 miles which is 684,000 km. It was estimated that the asteroid had almost missed striking the Earth by just 6 hours.
The experts have mentioned that if the asteroid had hit the Earth, then the resulting collision would have released an enormous amount of energy which is equal to about 600 megaton atom bombs. Thus it would have ended the planet in a catastrophic effect. The most important thing is that astronomers haven’t discovered this asteroid until March 31st. So only after nine days, American astronomers named Henry Holt and Norman Thomas at Palomar Observatory had discovered that the asteroids had flown by the Earth. According to Dr. Henry Holt, that was a close call on the cosmic scale of things. The asteroid was named after the Greek demigod of medicine and healing named Asclepius. Since then, there have been a few other near misses too occurred on an infrequent basis.
Other Celebrations on March 23
March 23 is also celebrated as
How To Celebrate Near Miss Day
Celebrating the Near Miss Day is quite simple. Thank the destiny which has given you a second life. It is essential to know more about the near-miss incidents that have occurred throughout history. Share that information with people around you to make them feel how fortunate we are to live on the earth. Make them celebrate and enjoy their life to the fullest as the life of a human can end at any moment. You can even get to know more about the solar system and the asteroids in detail. Use the hashtag #NearMissDay to share your views about this unimaginable incident and views about this Day.
Thank you for reading the post. You can celebrate every day with Happydays365.org and Happy Near Miss Day 2024.