An asteroid that for a few weeks was feared to impact the Earth now has almost 4% probabilities to collide with the moon, according to new data of the James Webb space telescope.
It is estimated that the asteroid, about 60 meters and capable of destroying a city, established a new record in February by having the most probability that scientists had never measured – 3.1% – to impact the earth.
A series of subsequent observations ended up ruling out that the asteroid – denominated 2024 YR4 – hit the earth on December 22, 2032.
However, the chances of crashing against the Earth’s satellite have been constantly increasing.
After the Webb telescope directed its powerful look at the asteroid last month, the probability of an impact against the moon is now 3.8%, NASA said.
“There is still a 96.2% chance that the asteroid does not hit the moon,” NASA said in a statement this Thursday.
Richard Moissl, director of the Planetary Defense Office of the European Space Agency, told AFP that this coincided with its internal estimates of around 4%.
The new Webb data also shed light on the size of the space rock, which had previously been estimated between 40 and 90 meters.
Now it is believed that it measures between 53 and 67 meters, approximately the height of a 15 -story building. This is significant because it exceeds the 50 -meter threshold necessary to activate planetary defense plans.
If the asteroid still had more than 1% chances of impacting the earth, “the preparations for one or more missions to divert it would already be starting right now,” Moissl said.
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The 2024 YR4 asteroid is the smallest object ever observed by the Webb Telescope
There are a variety of ideas about how the earth could defend itself against asteroids in the process of collision, including nuclear and laser weapons. But only one has been tested in a real asteroid.
In 2022, NASA’s Dart mission managed to alter the trajectory of a harmless asteroid after crashing a space probe against him.
Many scientists expect 2024 YR4 to hit the Moon.
“The possibility of observing the impact of considerable size on the Moon is effectively an interesting scenario from a scientific point of view,” said Moissl.
The phenomenon would offer a variety of information that would be “valuable for planetary defense purposes,” he added.
Mark Burchell, a space scientist at Kent University in the United Kingdom, told New Scientist that a lunar impact would be “a great experiment and a perfect opportunity.”
And on earth, “telescopes would certainly see it, I would say, and even binoculars could observe it,” he added.
“I wish it is a lunar impact,” said Alan Fitzsimmons of Queen’s University Belfast of the United Kingdom, in statements collected by New Scientist.
“It would have no effect on the earth, but it would allow us to study for the first time the formation of a lunar crater caused by a known asteroid,” he explained.
Asteroid 2024 YR4 is the smallest object ever observed by the Webb Telescope, which will offer new data to calculate the probability of impact again.
With agency information.
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