A huge mountain-sized asteroid has been discovered by a Russian scientist, who cites no immediate danger but has warned of an explosion '1000 times greater' than the Chelyabinsk meteor if it hits Earth.
Vladimir Lipunov, a professor at Moscow State University, discovered the asteroid 2014 UR116, which crosses paths with Earth every three years.
However, Lipunov said the space rock was of no immediate threat to Earth as its orbit is not close enough to the planet's.
However, the Russian professor warned that because trajectories of space rocks such as the '2014 UR116' are constantly changing due to gravitational pull of other planets, a 'small calculation mistake' could have 'serious consequences'.
"We need to permanently track this asteroid, because even a small mistake in calculations could have serious consequences," Lipunov told The Telegraph.
However, NASA has dismissed any immediate threat from the space rock for at least the next 150 years.
"Some recent press reports have suggested that an asteroid designated 2014 UR116, found on October 27, 2014, at the MASTER-II observatory in Kislovodsk, Russia, represents an impact threat to the Earth. While this approximately 400-meter sized asteroid has a three year orbital period around the sun and returns to the Earth's neighborhood periodically, it does not represent a threat because its orbital path does not pass sufficiently close to the Earth's orbit," NASA said in a statement on Monday.
The scare of an asteroid colliding with Earth has heightened after the undetected meteor entered the Earth's atmosphere and exploded above the Russian town of Chelyabinsk in February 2013. The blast blew out windows from buildings and left at least 1000 people injured.
The space rock, which was the size of a house, was reportedly not detected because of the sun's glare. Even as one lakh such space rocks float around Earth, scientists have been able to discover only 11,000 so far, The Telegraph said.
