This site provides information related to the recently discovered asteroid 1997XF11 and how close it will come to Earth in 30 years. The Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics provides a hyperlinked press release about 1997XF11, discovered by Professor James Scotti of the University of Arizona. The first estimates were as close as 30,000 miles. Scientists at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration's Jet Propulsion Laboratory disputed this estimate and came up with one of their own: 600,000 miles. The HSCA press release is useful in explaining the history of the discovery of 1997XF11, especially with respect to the coming possible "close encounter." It offers many hyperlinks to discovery observations, information about known Potentially Hazardous Asteroids (PHAs), information about prediscovery, as well as current ephemerides and ephemeris for 1997XF11, and information about forthcoming close approaches to Earth by asteroids and comets during the next 33 years. An orbit diagram of 1997XF11 is also available.
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