Summary
NASA has lowered the estimated risk of asteroid 2024 YR4 striking Earth in December 2032 to 1.5%, down from 3.1% a day earlier. The European Space Agency’s (ESA) estimate stands at 1.38%.
The asteroid, 40-90 meters wide, could cause significant city-level destruction but not a global catastrophe.
The projected impact corridor spans the Pacific, South America, Africa, and South Asia.
NASA also estimates a 0.8% chance of the asteroid hitting the Moon.
The global astronomical community expects the odds of an asteroid to hit Earth in December 2032 to eventually fall to zero.
I love how they make it seem like some insider expertise versus knowing basics of how percentages work.
I mean, without knowing what the number represents, it’s not obvious why it goes up and then suddenly drops like this.
They basically predict a cross-section of places it could go through, which shrinks with improved data. If the Earth is still inside, that makes it’s share go up. Eventually, it hits an edge and the share drops to zero suddenly
The way the world is going, it might not be a bad thing if it hits us.
Everyone hoping there’s still a chance, you need to remember… this is only a city-killer asteroid.
We need to hope for a much bigger asteroid.
If the alien movies serve us correctly, this is luckily going to hit the USA; possibly Washington DC directly.
If it hit the middle of the ocean, it could be cool and nothing else.
Would have been funny if it hit Buenos aires
As long as it falls on the right city, it would do the entire world a massive, once in 500 years favor.
Unfortunately North America doesn’t fall under the possible impact zone
We have a few years to improve our asteroid deflection capabilities to change that
More proof that there’s no god.
Washington D.C. I hope.
There is this fun toy see/calculate the potential effect of any asteroid collision: https://neal.fun/asteroid-launcher/
If it hits any city, that is wiped out. If it hit anything else, chances are damages are moderate.
So you’re telling me there’s still a chance
Damn
Bets on it being totally ignored by the world if it turns out to be aimed at Africa?
Africa actually does seem to be the most likely impact if it were to hit. The predicted impact would be along the equator.
Is this the new seven minutes to midnight? We’re 1.5% to asteroid.
Can we please not post daily updates? This is still 7 years away
Don’t look up.
I am down to have monthly updates for the next few years, weekly updates through 2031, and daily updates throughout 2032
I just feel like if we do daily updates for the next 7 years when it’s in all likelihood going to miss us, we’ll be too complacent when an asteroid does have an impact trajectory
As someone who’s played MMOs, 1.5% chance is actually pretty high.
As someone who played Ragnarok Online extensively, 1.5% for a single monster kill means I will never find that item.
Not to mention cards’ .01% drop rate ugh
As someone who’s played XCom, a 1.5% chance of a bad thing (questionable) means it’s gonna critically hit
Boourns!
Dontgivemehope.meme
Just give us the confidence interval and stop updating. We will know better in January 2029 once it has passed by and been tugged by our gravity and the moons.
Reminder that the asteroid is only large enough to destroy a city and, even given the rare chance of it hitting Earth, in all likelihood would land in the ocean and cause no damage. It’s not a doomsday asteroid
imagine if it falls and perfectly annihilates the trump administration though
Unfortunately, Washington is outside of the possible impact zone. (Well, Washington in Brazil is inside, but it’s not about that one.)
DART successfully moved an astroid that was probably way bigger!
