Giant asteroid Bennu could destroy earth

In a few weeks, scientists could be one step closer to understanding fundamental questions about the origins of our planet and the human race; from an asteroid that could threaten to destroy us.

The OSIRIS-REx Mission, headed by NASA and the University of Arizona, plan to launch an unmanned spacecraft on September 8 in the efforts to reach Bennu, a large near-Earth asteroid in August 2018.

The spacecraft will survey Bennu until a small vacuum-like device is capable of hovering above the asteroid and sucking up somewhere between 60 and and 400 grams of "gravel and soil" to bring back to Earth in the year 2023, according to Dante Lauretta, a professor of planetary science and cosmochemistry at the University of Arizona's Lunar and Planetary Laboratory, and the principal investigator on the OSIRIS-REx mission.

As a near-Earth asteroid, Bennu once existed in what he described as a main asteroid belt, located between Mars and Jupiter. There, it was likely dislodged by a gravitational pull towards Saturn, sending it closer to us. The asteroid could indeed strike Earth, and cause tremendous destruction.

Bennu has a one in 2,700 chance of hitting Earth, and such an event wouldn't take place for 150 years. People living in the year 2135 would know whether the asteroid posed a threat to hit Earth. Bennu would enter a "keyhole" located between the Earth and the moon that would send it in the direction of Earth.

A one in 2,700 chance isn't too insignificant. But by the time it would strike, we would likely have the technology to destroy Bennu.

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