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As citizens of the United States await a second round of financial stimulus from the government, another form of financial stimulus is coming from the skies. Unfortunately for any would-be space miner out there, the asteroid designated 2000 WO107 won’t be close enough for anyone on Earth to mine one of its mineral treasures. But an estimate from the online asteroid database Asterank is worth about $ 17.4 billion.
2000 WO107 is rich mainly in nickel, iron and cobalt, and is about to reach its minimum distance from our planet on 29 November. And its size is estimated to be between 370 and 820 meters, enough to cause significant damage if it collides with Earth. But this is almost unlimited space we are talking about, so the “minimum distance” is actually about four million kilometers from the Earth, about 11 times the distance between the Earth and our moon. In spatial terms, this is close enough to qualify as a “close approach” although there is no chance it will even come in sight of anyone here on the ground.
STAN HONDA / AFP via Getty Images
In addition to its theoretical monetary value, 2000 WO107 has some other interesting numbers associated with it. It is traveling in space at around 56,000 miles per hour, according to NASA’s estimate reported by The Express, and could be nearly as wide as Burj Khalifa – the tallest skyscraper in the world – is tall.
So it’s probably best not to pin big investments on this particular asteroid just yet. Perhaps someday in the future it will be possible for miners to extract valuable minerals from approaching asteroids, but such a project would naturally be extremely expensive to carry out. For example, while Asterank estimates this asteroid to be worth around $ 17.4 billion, the estimated profit is much lower – just under $ 726 million.
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