The Asteroid That Was Predicted to Hit Earth: See It in a New Image

A few months ago, an asteroid created quite a buzz. At one point, asteroid 2024 YR4 had a 3.1% chance of hitting Earth, creating plenty of headlines about its potential impact. The threat is all but gone, but we now have pictures of the once-worrisome asteroid. NASA's James Webb Space Telescope captured images of the asteroid with two cameras, including the Near-Infrared Camera and the Mid-Infrared Instrument. The former measures reflected light, while the latter shows thermal energy. The images were posted by the European Space Agency last week. The pictures demonstrate a couple of fun facts about the asteroid: It is the smallest object ever targeted by JWST's instruments to date, and it's one of the smallest objects ever directly measured. Estimates initially put the asteroid at around 40 to 90 meters. The actual size turned out to be 60 meters or around 180 feet. "These measurements indicate that this asteroid does not share properties observed in larger asteroids," the European S ... Read full article.