Asteroid 2024 YR4, with an estimated width of 40 to 100 meters, is scheduled to make a close approach to Earth in December 2032 and poses a potential collision threat. Due to its size and speed, this asteroid has garnered the ominous nickname “the city destroyer” online.

Leading space organizations, including the European Space Agency, currently estimate that there is a 2 percent likelihood of 2024 YR4 impacting Earth. This assessment will be refined as scientists gather more data about its trajectory. Although it is more probable that the asteroid will bypass Earth, potential impact zones have already been mapped out.

The extent of damage caused by 2024 YR4 would depend on various factors, including its makeup, velocity, and size. As the asteroid remains far from our planet, these properties can only be approximated, making predictions about the impact’s consequences somewhat uncertain at this point. Astronomers currently believe that if 2024 YR4 were to collide with Earth, it could produce an airburst—an explosion occurring in the atmosphere—equivalent to approximately 8 million tons of TNT, or 500 times the energy of the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima. This explosion could affect an area with a radius of about 50 kilometers from the impact site.

Regarding the potential collision site, experts like David Rankin from NASA’s Catalina Sky Survey Project have identified a “risk corridor.” Should the asteroid follow its current route and the 2 percent risk materialize, it could impact a wide area spanning from northern South America and across the Pacific Ocean to southern Asia, and into regions including the Arabian Sea and Africa. Nations such as India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Ethiopia, Sudan, Nigeria, Venezuela, Colombia, and Ecuador would face potential risks.

The risk associated with asteroids and comets that may threaten Earth is evaluated on the 11-point Torino scale: a higher score indicates a greater threat of substantial destruction if the object impacts our planet. Currently, asteroid 2024 YR4 has a Torino score of 3, signifying that it is substantial enough to warrant close observation. However, many global space agencies are optimistic that this risk will diminish over time as the asteroid’s trajectory becomes more defined. Initially, estimates of collision probability were at 1.2 percent, then adjusted up to 2.3 percent, before the latest reassessment put it at 2 percent.

This isn’t the first instance of such an alert, nor is 2024 YR4 the most alarming space object monitored to date. The asteroid Apophis, discovered in 2004, had a higher Torino score and collision probability at times than 2024 YR4. Soon after its discovery, it was estimated to have a 2.7 percent chance of hitting Earth. However, with further observation and analysis, scientists revised that figure to reflect a more realistic probability. As a result, although Apophis will come notably close to Earth in 2029, the likelihood of collision is now assessed to be zero.

In response to the potential risk posed by 2024 YR4, the United Nations has activated an emergency protocol focused on planetary protection. For now, due to its Torino scale classification of level 3, this involves ongoing monitoring to better understand the asteroid’s movements.

Additionally, strategies are being devised to safeguard Earth from potentially hazardous asteroids. Among these are kinetic impact missions that aim to redirect asteroids by launching rockets into space to collide with them. NASA’s 2023 DART mission demonstrated the feasibility of such strikes and the ability to alter the trajectory of space objects through a successful test on a harmless asteroid known as Dimorphos.

This article originally appeared in WIRED en Español and has been translated from Spanish.