NASA experts have announced that an asteroid approximately the size of a school bus, named 2025 BS4, will pass by Earth on Tuesday, January 27, 2025. The asteroid is estimated to be about 6.7 meters in diameter, with projections from the Jet Propulsion Laboratory's Center for Near-Earth Object Studies (CNEOS) suggesting a size range between 5.1 and 12.1 meters.
Traveling at a speed of 16.02 km/s (approximately 35,835 mph), 2025 BS4 will fly by at a distance of about 822,000 kilometers, which is roughly twice the distance between the Earth and the Moon, measured at 384,400 kilometers.
Most asteroids in our solar system are located in the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter. Occasionally, gravitational interactions with planets can eject an asteroid from this region, directing it towards the inner solar system and closer to Earth.
Jonti Horner, a professor of astrophysics at the University of Southern Queensland, remarked, 'Space is three-dimensional; although there are many comets and asteroids out there, most follow orbits that do not perfectly intersect with Earth’s orbit. Even if they cross the point where our orbit is at a certain distance from the Sun, they typically pass harmlessly well above or below Earth.'