NASA is tracking a bus-sized asteroid that will be zooming past the Earth today at a speed of nearly 28,028 miles per hour.
The space rock, known as “2025 FO6,” is estimated to be about 35 feet across, and will make its closest approach to our planet at a distance of about 502,000 miles, according to NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL).
However, 2025 FO6 is not the only asteroid expected to pass the Earth today. A house-sized space rock and three airplane-sized ones are also expected to make a near-Earth approach, although at a much greater distance.
2025 FA7, 61 feet long, will pass by the Earth at a distance of 1.22 million miles; a little further away, 2025 FC4, 2025 DV22 and 2007 EJ88, will miss the Earth by 2.68 million miles, 3.94 million miles and 4.51 million miles respectively.
Back in February a 130–300 feet long asteroid, known as 2024 YR4, sparked fears of a potential collision in 2032, although NASA has since confirmed that an impact is unlikely to happen.
If an asteroid this size were to collide with Earth, the scale of damage would depend greatly on where exactly it struck—and the angle of entry through the atmosphere, which affects the energy of the impact.
While small space rocks reach our planet all the time, they don’t usually cause any damage because of their size. Instead, these meteors (“shooting stars“) can be observed disintegrating in the atmosphere.
As NASA explains, the majority of near-Earth objects have orbits that don’t bring them close to Earth and so do not pose a risk of impact. A small portion of them measuring over 460 feet across, classified as potentially hazardous asteroids (PHAs), are closely monitored.
“This potential to make a close approach to Earth does not mean a PHA will impact the Earth. It only means there is a possibility for such a threat,” NASA explains.
Despite the number of PHAs out in our solar system, none of them are expected to collide with us any time soon. In fact, scientists believe that impact with an asteroid large enough to cause damage is very unlikely for at least the next 100 years.
The Center for Near-Earth Object Studies (CNEOS) continuously monitors all known near-Earth objects to assess any impact risk they may pose.
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