A small asteroid — which had just been discovered earlier in the day — disintegrated over Africa on Saturday, NASA said.

The tiny space rock, roughly six feet long, entered Earth’s atmosphere at the high speed of 38,000 mph and broke apart several miles above the surface, creating a bright fireball that lit up the evening sky, the agency said.

The event was witnessed by a number of observers and was caught on webcam video.

The object surprised astronomers shortly after its discovery, when its trajectory suggested it would pass very, very close to Earth just hours later, according to EarthSky.org.

When it was spotted, astronomers realized there was a possibility of an Earth impact. However, the asteroid was determined to be very small and therefore harmless.

“This was a much smaller object than we are tasked to detect and warn about,” said Lindley Johnson, Planetary Defense Officer at NASA Headquarters. “However, this real-world event allows us to exercise our capabilities and gives some confidence our impact prediction models are adequate to respond to the potential impact of a larger object.”

The object was first given the temporary designation of ZLAF9B2, but has now been renamed as asteroid 2018 LA by the International Astronomical Union.

It was much smaller than the meteor that exploded over Chelyabinsk, Russia, in February 2013, which was an estimated 60 feet wide. That meteor broke windows in six Russian cities and caused more than 1,500 people to seek medical attention, mostly due to injuries from flying glass, EarthSky said.

These are the discovery observations of asteroid 2018 LA from the Catalina Sky Survey, taken June 2, 2018. About eight hours after these images were taken, the asteroid entered Earth's atmosphereand disintegrated in the upper atmosphere near Botswana, Africa. </s> A small asteroid discovered Saturday morning, determined to head for Earth, impacted the planet's atmosphere just a few hours later, according to NASA.

The cosmic boulder, named asteroid 2018 LA (and previously listed as ZLAF9B2), was estimated to be only about 6 feet (2 meters) across. It was first spotted by the Catalina Sky Survey in Arizona.

"The discovery of asteroid 2018 LA is only the third time that an asteroid has been discovered to be on an impact trajectory," said Paul Chodas, manager of NASA's Center for Near-Earth Object Studies (CNEOS), in a statement. "It is also only the second time that the impact location was predicted well ahead of the event itself."

All three asteroids burned up in the atmosphere and caused no reported damage.

NEO watchers calculated that asteroid 2018 LA would enter the atmosphere somewhere over a corridor extending from Africa across the Indian Ocean to Papua New Guinea.

The final moments of the asteroid's existence appear to have been caught Saturday evening from a webcam in South Africa in the below clip. Although it looks like the fireball impacts the ground, it is really just disappearing over the horizon. NASA says it disintegrated several miles over the surface as it lit up the sky.

"This was a much smaller object than we are tasked to detect and warn about," said Lindley Johnson, planetary defense officer at NASA Headquarters. "However, this real-world event allows us to exercise our capabilities and gives some confidence our impact prediction models are adequate to respond to the potential impact of a larger object."

One such larger object was the asteroid that went completely undetected until it collided with the atmosphere over Russia in 2013, creating a shock wave that blew out thousands of windows in the town of Chelyabinsk, causing a number of minor injuries.

How much it's worth freaking out over these undetected or late-detected asteroids is up for debate. The smallest asteroids like 2018 LA are the hardest to spot, but also the least likely to do any damage. That said, it can never hurt to have more telescopes and eyes pointed at the sky looking for the next space rock aiming to knock on our door ... or break it down.

Solving for XX: The tech industry seeks to overcome outdated ideas about "women in tech." </s> A local farmer near Ottosdal in North West has shared CCTV footage of what appears to be a meteorite hitting the earth at 18:49 Saturday night.





According to a member of a neighbourhood watch, who shared the video with OFM News on social media, they were doing night patrol in the area of Hartbeesfontein when they received reports from Klerksdorp, approximately 30 kilometres away. People reportedly saw ‘a light’ falling from the sky and initially thought it was an aeroplane.

He told OFM News that everyone came together and started searching, but shortly thereafter received the CCTV footage from Barend Swanepoel and Wikus van Zyl from a farm near Bospoort and Gardau, an area not too far from Klerksdorp. On the video it appears to be more like a meteor that has fallen.

What could have possibly been the same meteor was lighting up the sky in China earlier Saturday evening.

According to Itv News, witnesses were stunned by a dazzling light which quickly took the form of a “flaming ball” over Yunnan Province. The Yunnan Observatory of the Chinese Academy of Sciences said it was a meteor.

Social media has also made mention of a meteorite that was discovered and given the temporary label – ZLAF9B2 – which reportedly slammed into the atmosphere over Botswana.

According to a physicist and Very-long-baseline Interferometry (VLBI) radio astronomer, Marshall Eubanks, this is a rare case of discovery before impact.

OFM News last night tracked the path of meteorite ZLAF9B2, with a projected diameter of between 0.5m and 3,5m, as plotted by Bill Grey on Twitter.

It looks like ZLAF9B2 hit the atmosphere over Botswana. There are reports of a vapor trail seen there. Plot is from Bill Grey https://t.co/ylIPUgKPhY pic.twitter.com/pqxf1oACBi

— Asteroid Initiatives (@AsteroidEnergy) June 3, 2018">

It looks like ZLAF9B2 hit the atmosphere over Botswana. There are reports of a vapor trail seen there. Plot is from Bill Grey https://t.co/ylIPUgKPhY pic.twitter.com/pqxf1oACBi — Asteroid Initiatives (@AsteroidEnergy) June 3, 2018

This a developing story.

It seems now that the asteroid *did* hit the atmosphere and exploded: the very bright fireball repored over Botswana in https://t.co/EhmmN0JxoX fits the asteroid's trajectory perfectly in space and time as https://t.co/KRS0iDRd0L (View / Expand Messages / scroll down) explains.

— Daniel Fischer (@cosmos4u) June 2, 2018">

It seems now that the asteroid *did* hit the atmosphere and exploded: the very bright fireball repored over Botswana in https://t.co/EhmmN0JxoX fits the asteroid's trajectory perfectly in space and time as https://t.co/KRS0iDRd0L (View / Expand Messages / scroll down) explains. — Daniel Fischer (@cosmos4u) June 2, 2018









CCTV FOOTAGE: Barend Swanepoel and Wikus van Zyl

OFM News </s> A small asteroid discovered on Saturday morning, June 2, 2018, surprised astronomers when its trajectory suggested it would pass very, very close to Earth just hours after being detected. The object has been given the temporary designation of ZLAF9B2. There are reports of sightings of a bright meteor, as well as a video that may be related to the event, from Barend Swanepoel in South Africa. He reports the video as being:

Another witness in South Africa described the meteor as very bright, and showing a yellow color.

This space rock had an estimated size of only 10-16 feet (3 to 5 meters) in diameter. If it struck (and sometimes they do, and meteorite pieces are found), it was too small to cause serious damages. In contrast, the impressive meteor seen over Chelyabinsk, Russia, in February, 2013 was an estimated 60 feet wide (20 meters). It broke windows in six Russian cities and caused more than 1,500 people to seek medical attention, mostly due to injuries from flying glass. The June 2 asteroid wasn’t big enough to do anything like that, but it was big enough to produce a spectacular, very bright meteor.

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The 60-inch (1.5-meter) telescope at Mt. Lemmon, which is part of the Catalina Sky Survey in Arizona, was the first to detect asteroid ZLAF9B2 on Saturday morning, according to clocks in North America. Alex Gibbs – principal engineer at the Catalina Sky Survey – posted these images of the object on his Facebook page:

According to NASA/JPL’s Center for Near Earth Object Studies (CNEOS), asteroid ZLAF9B2 approached Earth at 27,738 miles per hour (44,640 km per hour).

Models began suggesting that – in case of impact – the asteroid would enter Earth’s atmosphere somewhere between Indonesia, the Indian Ocean, or South Africa.

The reported observation of the color yellow in the sighted meteor is of interest because colors in a meteor provide a hint of its composition. Yellow suggest the rock contains sodium, as was also in the 2013 Chelyabinsk meteor.

Small asteroids are difficult to detect. Some space rocks might be dark, and may only reflect a small amount of sunlight as they may already be somewhat close to our planet.

However, as bigger asteroids reflect more light, they are usually detected weeks or months before closest approach.

Confirmation of the event is continuing to trickle in: </s> Image copyright NASA/JPL-Caltech/GSSR Image caption This composite of 30 images of asteroid 2014 JO25 was generated using Nasa's Goldstone Solar System Radar in California's Mojave Desert

A large asteroid the size of the Rock of Gibraltar has passed safely by Earth.

The object, measured to be almost a kilometre wide, came within five times the distance between the Earth and the Moon.

Known as 2014 JO25, the asteroid is the biggest such space rock to skim our world since 2004.

Astronomers say the best opportunity to view the rock will come in the dark hours of Wednesday night.

Radar imagery using Nasa's 70m (230 ft) antenna at the Goldstone Deep Space Communications Complex in California reveal a peanut-shaped asteroid that rotates about once every five hours.

The asteroid passed Earth at a distance of 1.8 million km (1.1 million miles) at 13:24 BST on Wednesday, 19 April.

The next known encounter of an asteroid of about this size will occur in 2027 when the 800m-wide (half-mile-wide) asteroid 1999 AN10 will fly by at one lunar distance, about 380,000 km (236,000 miles).
A 2–5-metre (6 ft 7 in–16 ft 5 in) wide asteroid named 2018 LA was estimated (before impact) to have an 82% chance of having impacted Earth today, with several corroborating reports from Botswana. An OFM media report from near Klerksdorp, North West province, South Africa, describes "'a light' falling from the sky" at 18:49 (UTC+02:00) Saturday night.