An asteroid may hit the Earth in 2032. Do humans need to save themselves? Experts: Don't worry.

Millions of years ago, an asteroid hit, causing strong winds, tsunamis, and the extinction of the dinosaurs that had ruled the Earth for more than 100 million years... Seven years later, will such a story also happen to humans?

Recently, a piece of news made many netizens exclaim "The Earth is in danger!" A study found that an asteroid 2024 YR4 with a diameter of about 100 meters is heading towards the Earth. Scientists predict that it may collide with the Earth in December 2032. At the same time, the United Nations launched the "Planetary Safety Protocol" for the first time to accelerate the construction of a planetary defense system, making ordinary people more anxious.

Space threats are coming, and the seven-year countdown has begun? To this end, Chao News reporters have verified with experts.

At 7:23 on December 23, 2020, a "fire meteor" streaked across the sky at the junction of Yushu, Qinghai and Qamdo, Tibet, and then landed on the ground. Image source: CCTV News.

An asteroid hit the earth. Who is this "alien"?

"This is not a scene from a science fiction movie. The news is credible." When receiving a call from a reporter, Cao Lin, an expert in popular science in the field of astronomy and a national leader in popular science work, specially checked the relevant information released by domestic and foreign official media and the European Space Agency. He believes that the possibility of an asteroid hitting the earth is not false news.

"First of all, we need to clearly distinguish between planets and asteroids." Cao Lin said that the objects mentioned in the news that may hit the earth are not Jupiter and Mars, which are well-known and large planets. He introduced that in astronomy, asteroids refer to celestial bodies in the solar system that orbit the sun like planets, but are much smaller in size and mass than planets.

Asteroids are not uncommon in the universe. Currently, more than 30,000 have been discovered by humans. The orbits of some of them intersect with the Earth's orbit, and there is a possibility that they will collide with the Earth.

The asteroid 2024 YR4 has a diameter of 40 to 100 meters, which is equivalent to the area of ​​a football field. It was first discovered by NASA's space telescope in December last year. Scientists analyzed that 2024 YR4 may pass by the Earth at a distance of about 127,699 kilometers on December 22, 2032.

After the discovery of the 2024 YR4 asteroid, experts initially estimated the probability of impact to be 1%. Later, the probability rose to 1.8%. As of press time, NASA's latest prediction is 1.9%. "The reason why the predicted probability changes is that the calculation method of the probability of an asteroid hitting the Earth is affected by factors such as orbital calculation errors, lighting and the gravity of large celestial bodies," Cao Lin told reporters. "This is similar to weather forecasting. The closer the time is, the more accurate the prediction will be."

The Purple Mountain Observatory of the Chinese Academy of Sciences conducted the 11th successful early warning of an asteroid impact in Yao'an, Yunnan. This is the observation image. Source: CCTV News.

Countdown to the end of the world? Experts: Don't worry

How powerful is an asteroid hitting the Earth? In this regard, Cao Lin assured everyone that the universe is huge and the possibility of people encountering such a "natural disaster" is very small. Ordinary people do not need to panic, as the probability of impact is extremely small.

"In fact, small celestial bodies come to Earth almost every month." Cao Lin gave an example, for example, the meteor shower we often talk about is the light produced when asteroids burn in the atmosphere. The meteorites that modern humans can often buy are also materials that fall from foreign celestial bodies hitting the Earth.

"This type of incident generally does not pose a threat to human life and property, but with the development of network communications and other reasons, it will attract more and more social attention," said Cao Lin.

At the same time, humans living on Earth already have a natural "golden bell". He told reporters that the thick atmosphere can effectively defend against most "attacks" from small celestial bodies.

When an asteroid enters the atmosphere at a very high speed, the high temperature and high pressure shock wave will cause the loose structure to disintegrate into fragments, and burn up at the first stage. Only those celestial bodies that are large enough and dense enough can break through the defense of the atmosphere and pose a threat to organisms on Earth. "But don't take it too lightly." Cao Lin said that asteroids may still cause devastating damage to space stations and spacecraft in the sky. The world's first large modular space station, Russia's Mir space station, was once hit by interstellar dust and left traces on its surface.

Asteroids are coming, is Earth ready?

Compared with the dinosaur family 66 million years ago, humans’ advantage is the constantly developing scientific “weapons”.

Knowing yourself and your enemy, you can fight a hundred battles without defeat. "Monitoring asteroids is actually a traditional project that has been developed by countries around the world for many years." Cao Lin introduced that humans have now formed the ability to study and predict the risk of asteroid impacts. Asteroid monitoring systems have been built in various countries. Through ground-based optical telescopes, etc., dangerous asteroids can be detected and tracked, and the impact time, landing point, and degree of harm can be predicted in advance, and effective disposal measures can be taken to minimize the risk.

In September 2024, at the Second International Conference on Deep Space Exploration (Tiandu), news came out that my country was planning to implement its first near-Earth asteroid defense mission and released the concept of the first near-Earth asteroid defense mission.

"There are many ways to change the threat of asteroids," Cao Lin said. "Although humans have not yet implemented these plans, the technical difficulty has not yet reached the level of going from 0 to 1."

For example, humans can impact asteroids. "Previously, NASA's 'Deep Impact' mission launched an impactor at Comet Tempel 1, successfully creating a huge crater on the comet's surface. This asteroid is much smaller than a comet."

For example, humans can also launch spacecraft to gravity-tug on asteroids and change their flight paths. "This method is relatively safe and reliable, and the control difficulty is also relatively small."

"So, even if an asteroid really heads for Earth, we should believe in the power of science, not be overly anxious, pay more attention to official sources of information, and live every day well," said Cao Lin.