An asteroid comparable to a 15-story building will pass by Earth on July 28 at 13:12 Italian time, NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) confirmed. Designated 2025 OW, the 67-meter space rock poses no impact risk as it will maintain a safe distance of approximately 633,000 kilometers—nearly twice the 384,000-km gap between Earth and the Moon.
Traveling at 75,000 km/h, the asteroid’s high velocity will limit observation time to just hours for astronomers and enthusiasts. It belongs to the Aten family, a group of over 2,000 asteroids with orbits typically inside Earth’s path but occasionally intersecting it. Aten asteroids like 2025 OW likely originate in the Main Belt between Mars and Jupiter, where gravitational interactions with Jupiter propel them inward.
Notably, the Aten group includes the infamous Apophis—discovered in 2004 and projected for an exceptionally close 32,000-km flyby of Earth on April 13, 2029. JPL also reports a second asteroid, 2018 BE5 (43 meters wide), will pass on July 28 at over 4.1 million km.
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