Using a system developed under an ESA contract, the Greek NELIOTA project has begun to detect flashes of light caused by small pieces of rock striking the Moon's surface. NELIOTA is the first...

The word "precovery" has entered the astronomical jargon rather recently but it quickly grew in popularity among asteroid hunters. It refers to the finding of an archival observation of an object...

The number of known near-Earth asteroids (NEAs) has just surpassed the threshold of 15000. That is a 50% increase over the number known in 2013, when we posted a similar news item on our portal for...

Asteroid 2016 RB1 has hit the news because of a peculiar close passage on 7 September 2016 at 19:20 CEST. About the size of a cottage, the asteroid flew past our planet at an altitude of 34000 km,...

ExoMars, the ESA/Russia mission en route toward the Red Planet, has turned into a remarkable observing opportunity for asteroid hunters. The post launch outbound trajectory of the spacecraft...

The end state for most near-Earth objects (NEOs) – asteroids and comets that may pose a hazard to the Earth's ecosystem – has for the past two decades thought to be a collision with the Sun. A new...

​​​​​​The impact of WT1190F in the Indian Ocean on 13 November (see our news item on 22 October) provided an excellent opportunity to simulate the observational sequence that needs to be triggered...

An object discovered on 3 October 2015, temporarily designated WT1190F by the observers, will enter the Earth's atmosphere on 13 November. It was discovered by the Catalina Sky Survey...

One of the major goals of the ESA NEO Coordination Centre is to focus observations on objects with non-zero impact probabilities. When an asteroid quickly becomes very faint just after discovery...

Each year, astronomers worldwide discover over 1000 new asteroids or other space rocks that could strike our planet. And if one is spotted heading towards Earth, experts working in ESA and national...

NELIOTA is an activity initiated by the European Space Agency (ESA), which was recently launched at the National Observatory of Athens. The project aims to count and characterise the number and...

ESA will host the International Academy of Astronautic's 4th Planetary Defence Conference (PDC 2015), entitled ‘Assessing Impact Risk & Managing Response', at the Agency's ESRIN establishment, near...

If an asteroid were spotted headed towards Earth, what could humanity do about it? ESA's latest mission is part of a larger international effort to find out. This month marked the start of...

ESA and national disaster response offices recently rehearsed how to react if a threatening space rock is ever discovered to be on a collision course with Earth. Last month, experts from ESA's...

On 18th November, ESRIN and the heart of ESA's NEO activities, the NEO Coordination Centre (NEOCC), welcomed an elaborate group of people involved in NEO activities in Europe. About 40 NEO...

The recent claim that asteroid 2014 UR116 may be threatening the Earth shows how difficult it is to convey the right message about the NEO hazard. The no-news spread after statements from the...

The Large Binocular Telescope (LBT), of which the Italian National Institute for Astrophysics (INAF) is a main partner, has successfully observed asteroid 2014 KC46 in one of the faintest...

The ESA Optical Ground Station has quickly become a major asset for the NEO Coordination Centre, thanks to the many nights devoted to observing asteroids. It is located at an altitude of 2400 m on...

After discussing what to do to ensure that an important NEO is adequately monitored (see "news archive"), we will now present a possible strategy to improve the orbit of old objects, that have not...

Spotting Earth-threatening asteroids is tough partly because the sky is so big. But insects offer an answer, since they figured out long ago how to look in many directions at once.

The observational component of NEO science is an extremely important part of the impact mitigation effort, since observations are the input data for all the computational models used to predict...

In the evening of 07 September 2014, the newly discovered asteroid 2014 RC will have a very close fly-by of just above 30000 km to our planet. The object is estimated to be between 10 and 30 m in...

Today the NEO Coordination Centre (NEOCC) celebrates its first year of activities. On 22 May 2013 the Centre was formally inaugurated at ESRIN by Thomas Reiter, ESA Director of Human Spaceflight...

A team of European astronomers has found a previously unknown comet, detected as a tiny blob of light orbiting our Sun deep in the Solar System.

With a mandate from the UN, ESA and other space agencies from around the world are about to establish a high-level group to help coordinate global response should a threatening asteroid ever be...

The first recovery campaign carried out by the ESA NEO Coordination Centre in coordination with ESO, using the Very Large Telescope (VLT) (VLT telescopes on the Paranal mountain in Chile (credit:...

In a fruitful collaboration between ESA and a group of amateur astronomers, the first comet was discovered by the so-called TOTAS survey. The comet is called P/2014 C1 (TOTAS) and has an orbit...

If an asteroid is discovered which could come very close to Earth, it is important to coordinate observational activities quickly to better know its precise flyby distance.This is illustrated by...

On 8 November 2013 asteroid 2013 TV135 has been removed from the Risk Page. The non-zero impact probability spotted by monitoring systems just after its discovery (on 8 October 2013) dropped...

Soon after having been spotted in the sky on 8 October 2013 from the Crimean Astrophysical Observatory (Ukraine), asteroid 2013TV135 topped the Risk Page. Being a relatively large object (500 m in...

Last month, ESA's near-Earth asteroid coordination centre triggered a series of European observations that confirmed an unknown object was, in fact, of human origin. The confirmation was the...

The number of known Near-Earth Asteroids has just overcome 10,000 units! This result represents an important achievement if one thinks that over the one hundred years between 1898 (when the first...

Although Gaia's primary mission goal is the precise measurement of star positions and not observing NEOs, nevertheless it is likely to produce a significant contribution to NEO detection. This is...

The data gathered by the US WISE mission have been released as public domain on 14 March 2012. This release provides improved calibration and processing algorithms.

While the sky becomes more and more continuously scanned by ground and space-based NEO surveys, discovering objects in unusual orbital configurations represents the new frontier. Their dynamics...

In a recent close-ish flyby, asteroid 2002 GT was studied in detail for the first time by a network of European astronomers. The observations were coordinated by ESA's asteroid centre in Italy, and...

A new series of images from Gemini Observatory shows Comet C/2012 S1 (ISON) heading toward an extremely close rendezvous with the Sun. The images have been takenbetween February and May 2013 and...

An interesting connection between Earth Observation and NEO monitoring activities has been unveiled through the NEO Coordination Centre participation at the "Big Data From Space" meeting, held at...

ESA today inaugurated a new hub that will strengthen Europe's contribution to the global hunt for asteroids and other hazardous natural objects that may strike Earth. Near-Earth Objects, or NEOs,...

In February, a speeding asteroid slammed into our atmosphere and exploded high over Russia's Ural region (on the left- Asteroid trace over Chelyabinsk, Russia, on 15 February 2013), injuring...