(NewsNation) — Astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson says we needn’t worry about the “mansion-sized” asteroid heading toward Earth.
The chances of 2024 YR4 colliding with Earth keep shifting, NASA reports.
In a recent update shared by NASA the asteroid now has a 1.5% chance of hitting Earth in December 2032, based on new observations since the full moon has passed, CNN reported.
Tyson joined NewsNation’s “CUOMO” on Thursday night to discuss how, in the unlikely event that the asteroid is on a collision course with Earth, to prevent such an event. He said NASA has run experiments that test its ability to achieve that goal.
“It is notable because it had the highest risk ever reported for an object of any significant size,” Tyson said on “CUOMO.” “Turns out last night that the latest estimate was downgraded, so don’t worry about it.”
When did NASA find the 2024 YR4 asteroid?
NASA first discovered “2024 YR4,” the 130-to-300-foot-wide asteroid, in December 2024, and found it only had roughly a 1% chance of impacting Earth on its trajectory, NewsNation’s Los Angeles affiliate KTLA reported.
On Jan. 27, 2025, the asteroid surpassed a 1% chance of hitting Earth, an “important threshold,” according to NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory.
“Currently, no other known large asteroids have an impact probability above 1%,” NASA said in a release.
NASA said its James Webb Space Telescope will observe the asteroid in March 2025 “to better assess the asteroid’s size.”