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Some believe that an asteroid 1.5 miles wide could touch the Earth in 2028 after several close runs.
The asteroid, known as the XF11 of 1997, finally crossed the Earth in June 2016 at a distance of 16 million kilometers, but some believe that the next approach could be much more devastating for us.
The space rock will return to Earth in a decade, rising to only 588,000 miles – with a lot of uncertainty in its orbit.
At 1.5 miles in size – the size of about 250 football fields or 125 double-decker buses – the asteroid would be big enough to completely destroy a city like London or New York.
According to Dr. Brian Marsden, Director of the Central Bureau of Astronomical Telegrams at the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory, when the asteroid was first discovered in 1997, it was thought that it could rise to less than 30,000 miles of the earth.
An approach so close to Earth could be influenced by the gravity of our planet, causing it to crash into our planet.
He wrote for Brit Astro: "Was an impact possible? The short answer is yes & # 39 ;! "
However, NASA has now managed to calm its fears, saying that the asteroid would safely transmit us out of the moon's orbit.
The space agency said: "The asteroid 1997 XF11 will pass far beyond the distance of the Moon in October 2028 with zero probability of impacting the planet, according to astronomers of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory of NASA, California.
Dr. Donald Yeomans and Dr. Paul Chodas, scientists at JPL, said the asteroid "should move to a comfortable enough distance of about 600,000 miles (about 960,000 kilometers) by 2028".
But the agency admits that it currently knows that less than 10% of all asteroids close to the Earth could threaten us.
Two smaller asteroids crossed the planet in an alarming way in 2016.
The 2016 LP10, with a length of two to eight meters, was closed at only 48,000 miles, about a fifth of the distance to the moon.
The 2016 LE10, with a maximum length of 23 meters, has covered nearly 280,000 kilometers.
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