Asteroid UW-158 is set to wizz past Earth today, carrying an estimated five trillion dollars in platinum.
Spectroscopic analysis has revealed the composition of the asteroid, and made it a prime target for future asteroid-mining missions. It is approximately 452 metres by 1,011 metres in size. If the analysis is correct, it could be carrying an astonishing 90 million tons of platinum. It will swing past Earth at a distance of 2.4 million km, and will not be visible to the naked eye.
Paging Bruce Willis...
(Score: 2) by TK on Tuesday July 21 2015, @01:47PM
Platinum on Earth tends to be found with copper, nickel and iron*. While not as valuable, those could be useful for other applications in space. You can't build a space station out of just platinum, after all.
*I have absolutely no idea if that is the case in space.
The fleas have smaller fleas, upon their backs to bite them, and those fleas have lesser fleas, and so ad infinitum