Will the gravitational pull of the asteroid Apophis affect planet Earth in 2029?

Question

According to astronmers, the asteroid Apophis will be within 18,640 miles of planet Earth in 2029, closer than our moon. This 885-feet in diameter asteroid may or may not crash into Earth, or explode in our atmosphere, in 2036, as these news articles explain,

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2006/08/17/tech/main1908951.shtml

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/17473059/

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2007/03/06/ap/tech/main2538944.shtml

Will the gravitational pull of Apophis have any noticeable effect on Earth in 2029? If so, what effects might we notice?

Ha ha, I do realize the Earth is quite a bit larger than this object, a lack of that knowledge is not why I asked the question. Given what the one article linked above said could happen if Apophis entered our atmosphere in 2036 and crashed into the Pacific ocean (and given what the article said about the 1908 asteroid that hit Siberia) AND because I am not a physicist, it's not at the top of my knowledge base to know how large an object traveling that fast would need to be to have any noticeable effect.

Also, I do know as noted in the articles that I included in the links, that the odds of Apophis entering our atmosphere in 2036 are small, but not so small to rule out the possibility which is why Apophis and other celestial objects are of concern to the people at NASA and elsewhere.

Answer 1

Yes it is scheduled to touch down in 2029 at the location where Tom Cruise's lair currently exists. Hopefully Tom will still be living there.

Answer 2

Scale, scale, scale.

people these days have no concept of the size of the earth.

This thing could be damaging locally, the same way a tiny bullet would hurt an elephant (except it would hit at 10 times the speed of a bullet).

However, to the Earth as a whole it would be like firing a bullet at a sizeable hill. The difference for us is that we live in a tiny gaseous envelope (the atmosphere). Any talk of destroying Earth is confusing people - really, an impact only needs to be sufficient to poison the atmosphere to wipe us out. The Earth will not suffer at all.

Also note that it has little chance of hitting Earth.

Answer 3

It is the other way around kid!

The question you should be asking is, After hundreds of orbits and fly-by between Earth and Venus until 2029 will the path of the asteroid can be disturbed enough to hit the Earth?

Try to shoot a bullet a quarter inch left of a soda can ten miles away in a jungle. Are you willing to bet any money on this?

Answer 4

Your average thunderstorm has more gravity effect that that little pebble. And no, it is not going to hit the Earth in 2029 or 2036. Probability of a hit is 0.000022, and will go way down when we get a better fix on the orbit, in 2013.

Answer 5

600 meters. Apophis will clearly miss this keyhole. As of October 7, 2009, the impact probability for April 13, 2036, is calculated as 1 in 250,000. A Level 0 on the Torino impact probability scale. New measurements confirm that in 2036 Apophis will quietly pass more than 49 million km (30.5 million miles; 0.32 AU) from Earth (and the keyhole) on Easter Sunday of that year (April 13).

Answer 6

Gravitational effect of this asteroid on the Earth can be neglected. It's mass is more then 1000000000000-times smaller than Earth's mass. And the speed of the asteroid is high, so it stay near Earth for hours only.

Answer 7

No. Apophis is less than 1,000 FEET wide, much less than one mile. It simply does not have enough gravity to cause any measurable effect on Earth.