Talk:2018 GE3

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Accuracy[edit]

This website takes issue with the "largest" statement in the opening paragraph: /asteroid-2018-ge3-is-freakiest-near-miss-earth-in-15-years/. Their quote follows:
"....Wikipedia and other sources are currently reporting that this is the largest asteroid to ever pass this close to Earth. However, a search of NASA near-Earth object observation data shows that a couple of larger asteroids passed within half the distance to the moon, one in 2001 and one in 2002...." I myself would have no idea.--Billymac00 (talk) 10:50, 17 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Hi Billymac00, thanks for pointing this out, sorry nobody has picked this up till now. I have just checked the NASA data and it agrees with your source. 2017 VW13 [1] and 2002 MN [2] passed within 0.5LD of Earth in 2001 and 2002 respectively. Both passed closer than 2018 GE3 and both had a brighter magnitude. This is not quite the same thing as saying they were larger but without knowing the actual size of any of these asteroids it is a good approximation to size. 2002 MN is only very slightly brighter than 2018 GE3 (absolute magnitude (H) 23.6 vs 23.8), so may in fact be smaller, but 2017 VW13 is much brighter (H 20.6) probably about four times the size of 2018 GE3. Thanks again for pointing this out. I'll go ahead and update the article. Rafflesgluft (talk) 07:17, 4 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Done. Looks like others had either seen your talk page entry or discovered the same thing another way because both the other asteroids were mentioned in the article, but 2017 VW13 wasn't mentioned in the largest/closest claim sentence, so I've added it. Thanks again for contributing. Rafflesgluft (talk) 07:27, 4 September 2018 (UTC)[reply]