2024 YR4: The dangerous asteroid
2024 YR4 is an asteroid about which there will be a lot of words and stories written in the coming years, and it is possible that it will remain permanently recorded in the history of the planet.
It was discovered on December 27, 2024, as part of the ATLAS (Asteroid Terrestrial-impact Last Alert System) mission in Chile, which led to observations by several large telescopes as part of the planet’s defense against small-body impacts.
The asteroid is classified as NEO, ie. near-Earth objects of the Apollo type, and these are potentially dangerous asteroids because they intersect the Earth’s orbit around the Sun, which can lead to the impact of that body on our planet.
This asteroid is estimated to be between 40 and 90 meters in diameter, which is a size that in the event of a fall on the planet could cause major local problems, but considering today’s universal connectivity of the world – it could also cause negative global consequences.
And what are the chances of that asteroid actually hitting the planet?
They are quite small, but the problem is:
- that those chances are growing for now and
- that when somebody threatens life and material goods, then even a small chance scares us.
We say that the chances of a coup are increasing.
First of all, it should be said that now the asteroid is leaving us, but it will return and on December 22, 2032, it can hit us.
The first risk estimates, based on the first observations and calculations of the trajectory of the asteroid, were 1.2%, then with new observations they increased to 2.6%, and now they are 3.1%.
And once again, the probability of an impact is low, but…. The stakes are high.
There is a chance, and scientists are hoping for this, that new observations, which increase the precision of the estimation of the movement of asteroids, will completely remove the danger, i.e. reduce it to zero.
And that happened before already, let’s remember the asteroid Apophis, but for now things are going like this as said.
The asteroid came close to Earth on December 25, 2024, at 828,800 kilometers (which is slightly more than twice the distance of the Moon from Earth) and is now moving away from us.
Its next passage will be on December 17, 2028, when it will pass us at about 7,931,000 km. Then the mentioned astronomers will observe it and calculate its path, which will contribute to the accuracy of the calculations.
Then there will be a new encounter on December 22, 2032, and then we will already know for sure how dangerous that asteroid actually is!
Soon, 2024 YR4 will be so far away that ground-based telescopes will no longer be able to track it, but the James Webb Space Telescope will likely take over observing this object. The orbital period of the asteroid is about 3.99 years, and the inclination of its orbit is 3.41 degrees in relation to the ecliptic.
To add at the end, the diameter of the objects that exploded over the Tunguska region in 1908 and that fell and burned 80 million trees in an area of 2150 square kilometers that were between 30 and 190 meters.
Fortunately, that object fell into a completely uninhabited area, so no human casualties were recorded at the time.
Let’s remember: APOLLO ASTEROIDS are asteroids whose perihelion (closest point to the Sun) are within the Earth’s orbit, and their aphelion (furthest point) in the main asteroid belt.
Some come very close to the Earth, so it is possible to fall on its surface. There are thought to be between 500 and 1,000 Apollos in the Solar System with diameters greater than one kilometer.
