NASA finds asteroid with an evil twin that’s ‘potentially hazardous’ to Earth

Nasa has captured the best ever images of a ‘binary asteroid’ made up of two space rocks orbiting each other. The twin asteroid is called 2017 YE5 and features one relatively bright object and darker evil twin. Both rocks are roughly the same size, which is highly unusual. It is only the fourth ‘equal mass’ binary near-Earth asteroid ever detected.

Although 2017 YE5 is classified as ‘potentially hazardous’, it’s not on a collision course with Earth. But if it did hit us, we would certainly know about it. The twin asteroids are each about 900 metres in size. If just one of them smased into our planet, it would wipe out a city, kill millions and cause devastation on a continent-wide scale. A twin impact could cause twice as much damage and force our species into a fight for survival.

Happily, we won’t have to think about it for almost two centuries. On June 21, the asteroid came closer to Earth than it will be for at least the next 170 years, coming within 3.7 million miles of humanity’s homeworld. Astronomers can easily track massive space rocks big enough to cause the extinction of humanity. But smaller asteroids which could wipe out a city might only be detected hours or days before they smash into our planet