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NASA is tracking a newly discovered asteroid that may be on a collision course with Earth. The asteroid, named 2023 DW, is the width of a football field and has a slight chance of crashing into Earth on Valentine's Day in 2046. According to projections from NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, the asteroid has a 1 in 560 chance of hitting the Earth.
"We've been tracking a new asteroid named 2023 DW that has a very small chance of impacting Earth in 2046. Often when new objects are first discovered, it takes several weeks of data to reduce the uncertainties and adequately predict their orbits years into the future," NASA's Planetary Defense Coordination Office wrote on Twitter.
If the asteroid continues on its path and does strike Earth, it will not cause too much damage. It is currently rated a 1 on the 10-point Torino Scale that ranks the hazard an asteroid poses. NASA said that an asteroid of that size is "likely cause local damage to the impact area."