‘City killer’ asteroid to pass Earth

And other stories from the stranger side of life

Illustration of an asteroid or comet striking surface of Earth
(Image credit: Tobias Roetsch/Getty Images)

An asteroid large enough to destroy a city will pass between Earth and the moon’s orbit this weekend. Nasa said it was rare for an asteroid so big to come so close to the planet and the close encounter will give astronomers a chance to study a space rock from just over 68,000km away. Earlier this week, the Daily Mail said an asteroid big enough to “blow off part of Earth’s atmosphere” is three times more likely to hit our planet than previously thought.

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Chas Newkey-Burden has been part of The Week Digital team for more than a decade and a journalist for 25 years, starting out on the irreverent football weekly 90 Minutes, before moving to lifestyle magazines Loaded and Attitude. He was a columnist for The Big Issue and landed a world exclusive with David Beckham that became the weekly magazine’s bestselling issue. He now writes regularly for The Guardian, The Telegraph, The Independent, Metro, FourFourTwo and the i news site. He is also the author of a number of non-fiction books.