It may be smaller, or larger. If it's too big, we may not be able to deflect it with one spacecraft. We'd need several to hit it perfectly, all without catastrophically breaking it.
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And with only a few years down the line, we could accidentally deflect it—but not enough to make it avoid the planet. Then, it still hits Earth, just somewhere else that wasn't going to be hit.
I'm not saying a kinetic impactor mission, or missions, couldn't work. But we don't have much time, and we don't have enough info about this rapidly fading asteroid to properly inform our planetary defense decisions yet.
Maybe 2024 YR4's odd will rise, and we will successfully deflect it in 2028 using a monster-sized spacecraft. Or maybe we'll break an awkward taboo and instead opt to use a nuclear warhead to try to deflect it, which would provide a bigger punch to the asteroid than DART.
Asteroid 2024 YR4 isn't likely to be a problem at all; it'll probably miss Earth. But if it doesn't, we have to be wary of trying to save the world but accidentally making the problem worse.
Maybe we'll just have to get out of the asteroid's way this time.
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Maybe we'll just have to get out of the asteroid's way this time.