10,000th Near-Earth Object Found

Astronomers have detected the 10,000th near-Earth object, asteroid 2013 MZ5. The asteroid was first detected on the night of June 18, 2013, by the Pan-STARRS-1 telescope on the summit of the Haleakala crater on Maui. Near-Earth objects (NEOs) are asteroids and comets that can approach the Earth's orbital distance to within about 28 million miles. They range in size from as small as a few feet to as large as 25 miles across.

› NASA's Asteroid Initiative