They are very attentive to what happens with their career. The asteroid that worries NASA lit the alarms when the possibility of impact in 2032 increased to 3.1 %. Now that risk dropped to 1.5%. It is a low probability, but the danger cannot be ruled out.
The name of the asteroid is 2024 YR4. It was discovered last December 27 in the Atlas telescope in Río Hurtado, Chile. It has a diameter of 55 meters. An asteroid that size impacts the earth on average every few thousand years. It could cause serious damage to a local region.
Disaster area
It was said that the object had a very small probability of potentially impacting. It went from 1.2 to 2.3 and then dropped to 2 percent, to rise on February 18 to 3.1 percent. Now it was updated to 1.5 in the February 19 update of the NASA Earth -Around the Object Studies Center (CNEs). In case of impact, the risk affects an earth’s surface band. It goes along the Eastern Pacific Ocean, northern South America, the Atlantic Ocean, Africa, the Arabic Sea and South Asia.
The observations are still ongoing. They make them from terrestrial telescopes involved with the international asteroid warning network. They will continue while the asteroid is still visible until April. After this it will be too weak to observe it until around June 2028. The NASA James Webb Space Telescope will also observe the asteroid. It will do it since March 2025 to better evaluate the size of the asteroid.
Uncertainty
As more observations from the asteroid orbit are obtained, its probability of impact will be better known. It is possible that asteroid 2024 YR4 be discarded as an impact danger. It already happened before with other objects from NASA’s asteroid risk list. But it is also possible that the probability of impact continues to increase. From ESA it is explained that the asteroid is now classified at level 3 on the Turin Impact Risk Scale. It is a close encounter that deserves the attention of astronomers and the public.
The asteroid orbit around the sun is elongated (eccentric). The asteroid that worries NASA right now moves away from the earth almost in a straight line. It is difficult to determine with precision your orbit studying how your career over time is curved.
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