A new NASA map shows how likely it is that an asteroid could hit Earth. Well, sort of. The map actually shows just how many asteroids are constantly flying around Earth with the potential to completely wipe out entire sections of our planet.
Although the map looks terrifying, an asteroid hitting Earth is very unlikely according to NASA . The map is cluttered with the trajectories of thousands of asteroids but based off of NASA’s careful calculations, an asteroid hitting Earth this century is not something to worry about.
In total, Earth is in the path of about 1,400 asteroid which are large enough to cause damage to the planet. All of these asteroids are “close” to Earth meaning that they are within 4.7 million miles, in terms of how large space is, that distance is not very far.
Although 4.7 millions miles might not be a whole lot of space, it is enough to prevent the catastrophe of an asteroid hitting Earth. The asteroids , or potentially hazardous asteroids as NASA calls them, are also close enough to hit Mars, Mercury, Jupiter, Venus, and then Sun. However, I am pretty sure that an asteroid hitting the sun would not result in anything serious.
Looking at the map would make anyone scared, all of the lines are clumped together making it seem like an asteroid hitting Earth could occur any day. Although even one of these asteroids could potentially cause a mass extinction event, like the one the dinosaurs went through, they are not likely in our lifetime.
There is one asteroid that NASA scientists are keeping a close eye on however. The VK184 asteroid has a very slight chance of hitting us in 2048, and by “very slight”, I mean that it poses virtually no threat to Earth. At this point, we should just look at the map and realize how lucky we are that Earth is in just the right place with the right amount of protection to prevent us from getting annihilated.
