Asteroid 2024 YR4 poses no threat to Earth in 2032
Recent calculations and observations by NASA have confirmed that asteroid 2024 YR4 no longer poses a significant threat to Earth, including the potential for a collision in December 2032, Kazinform News Agency correspondent reports, citing Nasa.
Asteroid 2024 YR4 was discovered in late December 2024 by one of the automated telescopes in the ATLAS network, located at the El Sauce Observatory in Chile. The exact size of this object is still unknown — current estimates by scientists suggest its diameter ranges from 40 to 90 meters.
Initial calculations showed a low probability of impact, but since then, additional data from the Minor Planet Center have allowed for a more accurate determination of the asteroid’s trajectory.
As a result of these latest observations, it is now clear that the asteroid will not intersect Earth’s orbit over the next 100 years. This reduces uncertainty in the predictions, and the asteroid's projected position in December 2032 is now far from our planet.
However, there remains a slight 1.7% chance that 2024 YR4 may collide with the Moon on the same day. NASA will continue to monitor the asteroid using observatories funded by the Planetary Defense Coordination Office and plans to use the James Webb Space Telescope in March to gather additional information on the asteroid's size for scientific purposes.
Earlier, Kazinform News Agency reported that NASA, SpaceX are set to launch two new missions on single rocket.