Five asteroids, with two of them bigger than the Eiffel Tower, are set to make a close approach to Earth today, the NASA officials have confirmed.
A report quoting the Central for Near-Earth Object Studies (CNEOS) said that three of these asteroids are relatively small, however, the other two are bigger than the Eiffel Tower (324 metres).
The smaller asteroids are relatively small and if they were headed straight to the Earth, they pose a smaller threat. The asteroids 2021 AC, 2021 AJ and 2018 KP1 have diameters of 73.5 metres, 19.5 metres and 41 metres.
The fourth one, 2016 CO247 is 340 metres wide, the biggest one, 2008 AF4, is half a kilometre wide. If 2008 AF4 were to hit the planet, its impact would be the equivalent of 25 megatons to 50 megatons, the same as the largest nuclear bombs in existence today.
Though the size of the asteroids matters while calculating the risk, their speeds can greatly alter the level of threat.
Read More: Asteroid bigger than London Eye approaching Earth, warns NASA
The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) has said that none of these five asteroids are an immediate threat to Earth.
They are being tracked because they are either closer to Earth than 7.5 million kilometres, which is 19.5 times the distance between the Earth and the Moon, or because they are bigger than 150 metres, the NASA said.
