Monnok t1_jdodiq3 wrote
Reply to comment by Peat02 in [NASA on Twitter] Newly-discovered asteroid 2023 DZ2 will pass Earth more than 100,000 miles (161,000 km) away–about half the distance to the Moon–making its close approach at 3:51 p.m. EDT (12:51 p.m. PDT) by ICumCoffee
Your Earth-volume : lunar-orbit-volume ratio works for the likelihood of finding the asteroid inside or outside of the Earth at any given moment.
But we can assume the object has an entire path of moments passing straight through on [basically] a line. An asteroid “looking ahead” directly at the round perimeter of the Earth might briefly occupy some point “in front” of the Earth before collision… but that’s still a collision path. And it’s never gonna get to any points on the other side. What it “sees” just is a flat disc in a flat disc. It’s either heading through the empty part or not.
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