Researchers attached to NASA's Near-Earth Object Program, have been tracking the asteroid since its discovery in late November.

The scientists, based at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in La Cañada Flintridge, put the chances that it will hit the Red Planet on Jan. 30 at about 1 in 75.

The asteroid, designated 2007 WD5, is about 160 feet across, which puts it in the range of the space rock that exploded over Siberia. That explosion, the largest impact event in recent history, felled 80 million trees over an area of 830 square miles.

The Martian atmosphere is so thin that an asteroid would probably plummet to the surface, digging a crater half a mile wide. The impact would probably send dust high into the atmosphere, scientists said. Such a plume might be visible through telescopes on Earth.

The Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, which is mapping the planet, would have a front-row seat. And NASA's two JPL-built rovers, Opportunity and Spirit, might be able to take pictures from the ground.

The asteroid's course has now taken it behind Earth's moon, so it will be almost two weeks before observers get another chance to plot its course more accurately.
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Furtunatly this asteroid impact on the Martian surface will provide us with more data and visual on the effects of a meteorite impact, will be interesting to see the effects this impacts has on the Martian surface and how the atmosphere reacts.

With this impact we could observe what a bigger impact would do on Earth. Let's just hope the asteroid doesn't hit the surface explorers.

ya.. poor lil guys- they are feeling old as it is i imagine. hate to see a meteor crush tthem into mars-mulch.
anywhoo... thanx for sharing this- havnt heard about it yet (hope i can catch the meteor either way in the telescope). could be quite a cool show.
clem

Too bad we won't be able to see the asteroid from Earth with any but the most utterly awesome telescopes unless it actually hits... on the bright side if it DOES hit, it will be on the side facing Earth, I looked up its orbit and it is going outwards after passing ~18 million km from earth a little while ago. So we'd be able to see the actual impact, not wait for the site to turn around.

I bet one of the probes orbiting mars could snap a few photos of the beast even if it doesn't hit... it'll still go pretty darn close!

I agree, this could be pretty interesting...

but will the eart travel through the dust cloud this asteroid creates on mars. what is or course in relation to the possible dust cloud that will be in space. what will be the effects on our atmosphere if we do cross thru the cloud. ok ok nevermind

No. By astronomical standards this will be a relatively small impact, around the size of the 1908 Tunguska impact in Siberia. The dust will not be spread into space and will not effect the Earth.


There will be no dust cloud in space.


See above.

Edited to add:

Incidentally the chances of an impact have been recalculated as 1 in 25. See HERE.

is there a slight chance that the asteroid, instead of hitting mars it would hit us?

Nope, not at all. It does not cross our orbit. It passed 17 million km away from us on its way outwards from nearer the sun in its elliptical orbit, thats when it was discovered.

And the chance of it hitting Mars has been upped to 4%, with more observations allowing them to nail down the orbit more precisely.

Then again, thats the same thing as saying theres a 96% chance of nothing happening...

Los Angeles - The chance of a football field-sized asteroid plowing into Mars next month has been increased to 4 percent, scientists said Friday after analyzing archival data.

The space rock, known as the nondescript 2007 WD5, was discovered in late November by the NASA-funded Catalina Sky Survey in Arizona.

The odds were increased to 1-in-25 this week after a Ph.D. student pored through the archives and plotted the asteroid's motions before its official discovery. The new information allowed scientists to improve their calculations of the asteroid's orbit and flight path.

Don Yeomans, who heads the Near-Earth Object Program at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, said he expects the odds to decrease with new observations gathered early next year.

The likelihood of an asteroid hit usually "peaks before plummeting to zero with additional data," he said. The asteroid poses no threat to Earth and is closing in on the Red Planet at 27,900 mph.

Should a collision occur, it would likely blast a half-mile-wide crater north of where the rover Opportunity has been exploring since 2004.
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Everyone:

I'm definitey keeping an eye on this developing story. Insofar as I know, we've never seen another terrestrial planet get slammed by an asteroid. Hopefully, there will be some attempt made to record the impact or even the near-miss, should that end up being what happens.

Sentinel

An asteroid no, however Jupiter took a series of huge impacts from multiple fragments of comet Shoemaker-Levy9 from July 16-22, 1994.

Ah, Shoemaker, what an interesting cosmic phenomena, I remember the astronomers mentioning that the blast radius could have swallowed the whole Earth. It was very interesting indeed.

interesting and scary. Those impacts left huge scars on Jupiter.. * shivers *

Fortunately planets like Jupiter attract the big meteors so they don't hit us.

If you'd like to see our own probabilities of asteroid doomsday http://neo.jpl.nasa.gov/risk/

Not really.

Only somewhat...Jupiter is certainly a 'larger target'. However, Earth is anything but 'bullet proof' in this regard.

Take a look here.

The Moon also covers us slightly from asteroid impacts due to it's proximity, but it's not much of help either.

Have the remains of the impacts not cleared from the observable survace of Jupiter? Can't believe it was virtually 14 years ago!

Can't believe it missed Mars.