an asteroid I now have roughly the size of the soccer field. 1.5% chance According to NASA, it hit the planet in about eight years – at one point its estimate reached 3.1%. Such an impact could be urban-level devastation, depending on where it is, if it occurs.
Bill Harwood, a consultant at CBS News Space, said it would be “really catastrophic” if it lands in a densely populated area, but that the effect would be localized.
“It’s not like a rock that killed the dinosaurs,” Harwood said. “It won’t affect the global climate, but it’s certainly going to be a disaster of every proportion, so we all hope that doesn’t happen.”
Scientists haven’t panicked yet, but they look a lot.
“At this point, it’s ‘Let’s pay a lot of attention. Let’s get as many assets as we can observe it,” said Bruce Betts, chief scientist at the Planetary Society, in AFP. He told the company.
What we know about the possibility of collision with YR4 and Earth in 2024
The asteroid, called the 2024 YR4, was first discovered on December 27, 2024 by Elsau Observatory in Chile. Based on its brightness, astronomers estimate it is between 130 and 300 feet wide.
“Asteroids of this size can affect Earth on average every millennia, causing serious damage to local areas,” the European Space Agency said in a statement.
By the Great Year Day, it had landed at Kelly’s desk, an acting planetary defense officer for the US Space Agency NASA, as a subject of concern.
“You got an observation and they’re going to fall again. This seemed like it could stick,” she told AFP.
The risk assessment continued to climb, and on January 29th, the international Asteroid Warning Network (IAND), a global planetary defense collaboration, issued a memo.
According to the latest calculations from NASA’s Jet Propulsion Research Institute, 1.5% chance Of the asteroid’s incredible Earth on December 22, 2032, NASA said the probability of “continuing to evolve” would “continuing to evolve” as scientists collect new observations of asteroids in days and weeks. He said he would expect it.
Asteroid 2024 YR4 is currently rated at 10 levels 3 on the Turin Impact Hazard Scale. This is a “close encounter” that requires attention from astronomers and the public.
If it was a hit, potential shock sites include IAND memos in the East Pacific, Northern South America, Atlantic, Africa, the Arabian Sea and South Asia.
The 2024 YR4 follows a very elliptical four-year orbit, passing through the inner planet before shooting past Mars towards Jupiter.
For now, it’s zooming from Earth and the next close pass will not come until 2028. Scientists can see the asteroid again, Harwood says, and determines its orbit and orbit.
“The odds are very good. This not only hits the Earth, but at some point in the next few months or years, the chances will be zero.”
A similar scenario unfolded in 2004 at Apophis. Apophis was predicted to have a 2.7% chance of hitting the Earth in 2029. Further observations eliminated the effects.
“City Killer” category
The most infamous asteroid impact occurred 66 million years ago. A six-mile wide space lock caused the world’s winter, wiping out 75% of dinosaurs and all species.
In contrast, the 2024 YR4 falls under the “City Killer” category.
“If you put it on top of Paris, London or New York, it basically wipes out the entire city and some of the surroundings,” Betts said.
The best modern comparison is at the 1908 Tungska event, where 30-50 meters of asteroid or comet fragments explode in Siberia, flattening 80 million trees over 770 square miles.
Like that shocker, the 2024 YR4 is expected to explode into the sky rather than leaving a crater on the ground.
“You can calculate energy… using mass and velocity,” said Andrew Livkin, a planetary astronomer at Johns Hopkins’ Institute of Applied Physics.
In the 2024 YR4, the explosion from the airburst equals about 8 megatons of TNT. This is more than 500 times more powerful than the Hiroshima bomb.
If it explodes in the ocean, the impact is not a concern unless it occurs near a tsunami-causing coastline.
Time to prepare
Good news, experts say you have plenty of time to prepare.
Ribkin led the investigation NASA’s 2022 Dirt Missionusing the spacecraft to fine-tune the asteroids from its course. This is a strategy known as the “motor impact factor.”
The target asteroid poses no threat to Earth and has become an ideal subject.
“I don’t know why it’s not working,” he said. The bigger question is whether major states will fund such missions if their own territory is not under threat.
Other more experimental ideas exist.
The laser evaporates part of the asteroid to create a thrust effect and pushes it out of the course. “Gravity Tractors” are also theorized as large spacecraft that use their own gravity pull to slowly pull asteroids.
If everything else fails, a long warning time means that authorities can evacuate the impact zone.
“No one should be scared of this,” Fast said. “We have the ability to find these things, make these predictions and plan them.”
Still, NASA tracks close approaches and calculates the odds of those cosmic rocks, such as asteroids, meteors, metstones, and more, which affect Earth.
“Most of the nearest Earth objects have orbits that make them very close to Earth, and therefore there is no risk of impact, but a small portion of them, known as potentially dangerous asteroids, requires more attention. “The Jet Propulsion Laboratory, which manages NASA’s center dedicated to studying Earth’s objects near the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, which manages the NASA.
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