PASADENA, Calif. (March 4) - An asteroid about the size of one that blasted Siberia a century ago just buzzed by Earth.

NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory reported that the asteroid zoomed past Monday morning.

The asteroid named
2009 DD45 was about 48,800 miles from Earth. That is just twice the
height of some telecommunications satellites and about a fifth of the
distance to the Moon.

The space ball
measured between 69 feet and 154 feet in diameter. The Planetary
Society said that made it the same size as an asteroid that exploded
over Siberia in 1908 and leveled more than 800 square miles of forest.

Most people probably
didn't notice the cosmic close call. The asteroid was only spotted two
days ago and at its closest point passed over the Pacific Ocean near
Tahiti.