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Space Earth

Astronomers Discover 196-Foot Asteroid With 1-In-83 Chance of Hitting Earth In 2032 84

Posted by BeauHD from the PSA dept.
Astronomers have discovered a newly identified asteroid that has a 1-in-83 chance of striking Earth on December 22, 2032, though the most likely scenario is a close miss. Designated as 2024 YR4, the asteroid measures in at 196 feet wide and is currently 27 million miles away. Space.com reports: The near-Earth object (NEO) discovered in 2024, which is around half as wide as a football field is long, will make a very close approach to Earth on Dec. 22, 2032. It's estimated to come within around 66,000 miles (106,200 kilometers) of Earth on that day, according to NASA's Center of NEO Studies (CNEOS). However, when orbital uncertainties are considered, that close approach could turn out to be a direct hit on our planet.

Such an impact could cause an explosion in the atmosphere, called an "airburst," or could cause an impact crater when it slams into the ground. This is enough to see asteroid 2024 YR4 leap to the top of the European Space Agency's NEO impact Risk List and NASA's Sentry Risk Table. "People should absolutely not worry about this yet," said Catalina Sky Survey engineer and asteroid hunter David Rankin. "Impact probability is still very low, and the most likely outcome will be a close approaching rock that misses us."

As for where it could hit Earth, Rankin said that the "risk corridor" for impact runs from South America across the Atlantic to sub-Saharan Africa.
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Astronomers Discover 196-Foot Asteroid With 1-In-83 Chance of Hitting Earth In 2032 More

Astronomers Discover 196-Foot Asteroid With 1-In-83 Chance of Hitting Earth In 2032

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  • So, I gotta ask (Score:5, Funny)

    by 93 Escort Wagon ( 326346 ) on Thursday January 30, 2025 @02:06AM (#65129887)

    What are the odds this is just that Tesla, once again?

  • Astroturfing (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward on Thursday January 30, 2025 @02:14AM (#65129895)

    Is this fake news? The article mentions astronomers, but then uses units such as miles and feet, and astronomers would never use those in 2025.

  • Measurements (Score:4, Funny)

    by AdeBaumann ( 126557 ) on Thursday January 30, 2025 @02:25AM (#65129899) Homepage

    How long is half a football field in libraries of congress?

  • "Risk Corridor" (Score:5, Interesting)

    by cmseagle ( 1195671 ) on Thursday January 30, 2025 @03:30AM (#65129925)

    Hoping someone with expertise can explain this statement:

    As for where it could hit Earth, Rankin said that the "risk corridor" for impact runs from South America across the Atlantic to sub-Saharan Africa.

    If there's still a lot of uncertainty around whether it will impact the earth at all, how can astronomers predict where on earth it is likely to strike? My simplistic assumption would be that if the error bars on our observations are big enough that we don't know if it'll hit, those same error bars would also mean that we aren't able to predict so precisely where that impact would be.

    • Re:"Risk Corridor" (Score:5, Insightful)

      by rossdee ( 243626 ) on Thursday January 30, 2025 @03:49AM (#65129943)

      Presumably they can work out which side of the planet is going to be facing the rock as it comes in.

    • Re:"Risk Corridor" (Score:4, Informative)

      by e3m4n ( 947977 ) on Thursday January 30, 2025 @07:21AM (#65130113)

      They know its trajectory and that its currently moving away from earth. They know when it will orbit back around. Based on this info they know what part of earth will be facing the angle of incident. What they dont have nailed down is a degree or two of trajectory which could amount to hundreds of thousands of miles. Still a near miss in the grand scope. However they have a good approximation of where the earth is facing and the axial tilt angled toward the asteroid. This gives them a slice of area to indicate a range of possible impact. When the time comes I bet these areas are going to be no fly and no ship zones. We might see transport halted for 48 hours.

      • When the time comes I bet these areas are going to be no fly and no ship zones.

        Well, everybody on that side of the earth will just have to travel to the other side on that day.

      • The hit chance will have been log calculated by then, as well as the exact hit point, give or take a couple hundred kilometers, to account for minute gravitational trajectory shifts.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by e3m4n ( 947977 )

          the real problem is going to be water strike vs a crater. A crater strike that big could create a local cooling effect from all the dust attenuating the sun. Maybe a regional micro ice-age that lats for a few years. A water strike will probably create a tsunami that is farther reaching and destruction more geographically spread out. You dont want to be a container ship in the wake of that mess for sure. I want to say a land strike would be favorable, but I am just not sure TBH.

    • By the time it will reach earth and either hit or miss, we still know which side of earth is facing to it.

    • Because we can simulate the rotation of the earth over time and project the ballistic path of the rock? There's some margin of error in the simulation, which is why they can only narrow it down to that "risk corridor" because they don't even know if we're really in the ballistic path yet.

    • If there's still a lot of uncertainty around whether it will impact the earth at all, how can astronomers predict where on earth it is likely to strike?

      Trump signed an executive order declaring the asteroid can only hit the southern hemisphere.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by pz ( 113803 )

      There is a mean projected path that has a projected impact location. There is uncertainty around that mean path. This follows from the basic statistics of an observation that includes noise.

    • The Earth moves along it's orbital path through one Earth-diameter in approximately 20 minutes (IIRC ; I could work it out more precisely if called to) . In that time, it rotates by about (360 degrees/ 24 hours/ 60 minutes * 20 = 360/ 24/ 3 ~=5 degrees.

      So, if the impactor's arrival time at Earth's orbit were known well enough to know if it would intersect (20 minutes-odd accuracy) it's longitude could be predicted within 5 degrees of longitude. It wouldn't be a north-south strip of longitude, because the i

  • Great (Score:3)

    by dlarge6510 ( 10394451 ) on Thursday January 30, 2025 @03:52AM (#65129947)

    So as I celibrate my 52nd birthday I can either watch it fly by the Earth and take photos with my telescope or go out with a bang!

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by _merlin ( 160982 )

      Dammit, don't remind me how old I am. Even my 6-digit UID makes me look old these days.

    • celibrate

      That's a typo for quite a few possible words, all of them kind of fitting the rest of the comment.

    • 3rd possibility: NASA carefully nudges it just enough to make it hit Orlando, FL and save Social Security so that you'll be able to receive your full benefit when you retire.

      • Why would it hitting anywhere in the US affect me at all?

        What is Social Security?

        > you'll be able to receive your full benefit when you retire

        What benefit? You mean my pension? Well with the way pensions are these days I'm going to need to save loads of pounds in a good ISA and maybe a bond or two to make up the difference.

        That is if Kier doesn’t raid it and my savings first.

  • METEOR 2032! (Score:5, Funny)

    by indytx ( 825419 ) on Thursday January 30, 2025 @06:50AM (#65130085)
    I'm finally excited about a bumper sticker.

  • And they are only 1% maybe confident in this assessment which is 50-50 in probability, perhaps, possibly. :)

    JoshK.

  • You've got to ask yourself one question: 'Do I feel lucky?' Well, do ya, punk?"

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by jonadab ( 583620 )
      I mean, on the one hand, 1/83 is abnormally high odds of impact for an NEO.

      On the other hand, the 196-foot diameter is fairly unremarkable; we would expect it to have an impact energy somewhere around a tenth of a percent of the Tunguska event, give or take (depending on things like density and angle of approach). This isn't going to be a literal Earth-shattering kaboom, even if it does hit.

      Could do some local damage, though. The human impact of the Tunguska event was low partly because it landed in such

  • This or Apophis in 2036? Place your bets, people! You may not survive to get the payout if one actually hits, but think of how big that payout could be if you guess right?

  • "People should absolutely not worry about this yet,"

    As for where it could hit Earth, Rankin said that the "risk corridor" for impact runs from South America across the Atlantic to sub-Saharan Africa.

    I can't help but think that if the strike region was the US and Europe there would be a bit of worry, at least talking about intercept missions.

    • I can't help but think that if the strike region was the US and Europe there would be a bit of worry, at least talking about intercept missions.

      Has anyone checked for valuable minerals? This might actually be a goldmine!

      • It's an asteroid.

        With no other information than that, it's a less than 10% probability of having significant metal content, and more like 1% probability of being 50% or more metal by mass. 90%-odd of that metal will be iron and nickel. Parts per million of "currency metals".

        99% probability of it being mineralogically uninteresting. Even to geologists.

    • There's still plenty of time for that. I'm sure Musk has someone working some maths to see if they can bill the US government for a cargo mission to deliver a W89 warhead within the vicinity of this thing at exorbitant cost, so he can put it in Orange Caligula's ear.

  • I took it for granite.

  • Well, it will solve the Year 2038 problem (Score:5, Funny)

    by jfdavis668 ( 1414919 ) on Thursday January 30, 2025 @10:26AM (#65130411)
    As long as no UNIX machine survives.
  • 2032? BUT I WANT IT NOW!

  • This one is likely no risk but that they can detect a 50-meter asteroid means that bigger ones are detectable.

    We plow tons of money into really stupid shit but planetary defense isn't one of them.

    • This one is likely no risk but that they can detect a 50-meter asteroid means that bigger ones are detectable.

      We plow tons of money into really stupid shit but planetary defense isn't one of them.

      The small planetary moon size are easy to track, but just because we spot some small ones does not mean we couldn’t be caught off guard. We get plenty that are discovered only days or weeks out, and pretty much for sure have missed ones coming close within a handful of earth diameter like this. Plus 60m if it’s solid rock and gets a steep enough impact looks like a 10 megaton explosion, with a shotgun breakup and craters totaling about 100m across. It would be small as far as impacts could be

    • To extend "burtosis" 's reply - the Chelyabinsk 2013 impactor was similar in size to this one, but because it was an "Earth crosser" that hit us going "out" (Venus range to Mars range). So as it was getting closer to Earth, it was visible in the morning sky, close to the Sun.

      That is a combination that you can spell differently : "burned out CCD". Hence, it's a direction we're likely to be (relatively) blind in, at least until we have 1/4-Hubble (my guess, educated) space telescopes at both leading and trai

  • So, we'll all be safe as long as we don't live in Buenos Aires.

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