Don't Look Up or Armageddon? Asteroid may hit in 2032, possible deflection mission

[noblegiraffe]

An asteroid has been discovered that may hit the Earth in 2032. The odds a few days ago were calculated at 1 in 67, now it's 1 in 44. It would hit the Earth with the force of a thousand Hiroshimas.

This thread explains that we can only see it till April, when it will disappear till 2028 which will be our best chance of a deflection mission. We will need to decide to start planning that very shortly if that's the decision that is taken.

https://x.com/astro_jonny/status/1886742128199336362?s=61&t=U9XrcF693-JpMxeIueYG7g

It's still overwhelmingly unlikely that it will hit the Earth.

I do feel, as a millennial that this has all been quite unfair since 2020!!! Global pandemic, nuclear threat, AI and now this?!!! All those films we watched (outbreak , deep impact , Armageddon , terminator) 😂😂😂

Would that mess up the tides too?

I feel like 2015 was fairly stable but that was the last time!

Wasn’t there a disaster movie about the destruction of the moon too?

Yeah, Moonfall, it was so bad it was good. I think the moon was an alien though.

I wonder at what percentage likelihood of impact they will start planning a mission, they must have a threshold.

Ooh the odds of impact with Earth have dropped to 0.28% which is good.

However the odds of it hitting the moon have increased to 1%

So 🤷‍♀️

Didn't an asteroid hit the moon about ten years ago, not the first time it has taken one for the team.

Well I'm not going to panic. I'm so tired of media scaremongering, it's tedious. Humans are the biggest danger to other human, and the planet in ecological terms.

Where did you see this?

Here https://blogs.nasa.gov/planetarydefense/

I saw this as well its been reduced to a 1 in 62 chance of a hit with a 0.8% chance it will hit the moon, something to do with the full moon affecting their calculations.

Thank you

I thought the world has already supossedly ended multible times?

You ever played snooker?

I think the Martians are more worried about us coming there.

You mean 2.8%

https://blogs.esa.int/rocketscience/2025/02/19/2024-yr4-surpasses-apophis-as-riskiest-asteroid-ever-detected/

On 18 February 2025, the probability that asteroid 2024 YR4 might impact Earth on 22 December 2032, as assessed by ESA’s Near-Earth Object Coordination Centre, rose to 2.8%.
This means that 2024 YR4 has now surpassed the 2.7% chance of impact briefly associated with the much larger asteroid (99942) Apophis back in 2004.
For asteroids larger than 30 metres in size, 2024 YR4 now holds the record for the highest impact probability reached, and the longest time spent with an impact probability greater than 1%.

Is it correct that civilisation ending asteroids can approach with no prior warning at all? If not from the angle we detect?

It’s not big enough to panic about. It’ll most likely miss, and if not they’ll calculate where it would hit and tell people to evacuate.

It could do some localised damage, but it’s not a planet killer.

The DM and similar just like the Armageddon style headlines.

Yes. We cannot monitor the whole sky, so whether we spot one in time to react at all depends on its size, composition (we need it to reflect light well enough), trajectory, and whether anyone looks in that direction.

fortunately the odds are in our favour…there a hell of a lot of space one could travel through, where we are not.

How fascinating! Let's say that it does indeed turn out to miss hitting the earth. Would that make any difference to your eagerness to invent conspiracy theories, or will you just ignore it and carry on with your paranoia?

@OxfordInkling thank you. I wonder if the dinosaur ending comet would have been picked up in advance? It sounds like the odds are greater (?) we’ll get no warning at all re: a civilisation ending asteroid? The odds very small of either a ‘visible’ or ‘invisible’ threat.

If it does hit with the energy of "1,000 Hiroshimas" then we already know what kind of effect that would cause as there have been nuclear weapon tests bigger than that. It's not big enough to cause a devastating tsunami or affect the climate, but it would be big enough to destroy a city.

No, I meant 0.28%, as that is what the NASA blog I linked to said. https://blogs.nasa.gov/planetarydefense/

New observations since your linked blog have reduced the probability.

Looking better now

https://www.theguardian.com/science/2025/feb/24/chance-giant-asteroid-hitting-earth-2032-falls

As a result, a planetary defence response was triggered, beginning with experts closely tracking the trajectory of the asteroid. Initially the likelihood of an impact in 2032 rose, reaching 3.1% on 18 February this year, but data from Nasa reveals it is now 0.0017%.

In other words, there is 99.9983% chance the asteroid will miss Earth. Indeed, the “city-killing” asteroid currently ranks zero on the Torino impact hazard scale that ranges from a no-risk nought to a global-catastrophe 10.