Space is rarely as empty as it seems. While the headlines rarely cover it, NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory quietly tracks a steady stream of space rocks making their way past our cosmic neighborhood. Right now, five asteroids are making close approaches to Earth — and none of them pose any threat. But the numbers are still worth appreciating.
Here’s a breakdown of the next five asteroid approaches, straight from NASA JPL’s Asteroid Watch Dashboard.
The Next Five Asteroid Approaches
01
2026 ET2
📅 March 16, 2026
📏 ~25 ft (Bus-sized)
📡 495,000 miles away
The smallest of the bunch, roughly the size of a city bus. At 495,000 miles out — about twice the distance to the Moon — it passed by with zero drama.
02
2026 EY2
📅 March 16, 2026
📏 ~35 ft (Bus-sized)
📡 986,000 miles away
Slightly larger than its same-day sibling, 2026 EY2 swung by at nearly four times the Earth-Moon distance. Completely harmless and barely the size of a large RV.
03
2026 CR3
📅 March 16, 2026
📏 ~230 ft (Airplane-sized)
📡 4,640,000 miles away
The largest of the five and the one worth watching. At 230 feet across it sits just under NASA’s “potentially hazardous object” threshold of ~490 feet. It passed comfortably at over 4.6 million miles — nearly 20 times the distance to the Moon.
04
2015 VO142
📅 March 17, 2026
📏 ~18 ft (Car-sized)
📡 649,000 miles away
A return visitor first catalogued over a decade ago. At just 18 feet across — roughly the length of an SUV — it would burn up entirely in the atmosphere long before reaching the surface.
05
2026 EZ2
📅 March 17, 2026
📏 ~160 ft (Airplane-sized)
📡 2,340,000 miles away
Rounding out the five, 2026 EZ2 is 160 feet across — about the length of a commercial aircraft fuselage — and sailed past at roughly 10 times the distance to the Moon.
How Many Asteroids Actually Hit Earth Last Year?
Probably more than you’d expect — but the answer depends a lot on what you mean by “hit.”
In 2025, NASA’s Center for Near Earth Object Studies (CNEOS) tracked 189 known asteroid close approaches that came within one lunar distance of Earth. But actual atmospheric entries are a different story: none of the objects that collided with Earth’s atmosphere in 2025 were discovered in advance. They were detected visually or captured by infrasound sensors — the same technology used to monitor nuclear detonations — after the fact. Every one of them was small enough to burn up harmlessly high in the sky.
The 2024 YR4 story: The headline-grabber of last year was asteroid 2024 YR4, which briefly alarmed astronomers after its discovery in December 2024. It was initially thought to have a notable chance of hitting Earth in 2032. Continued observations using NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope ultimately ruled out any impact risk — to Earth or the Moon.
Meanwhile, the broader catalog keeps growing fast: by November 2025, the number of known near-Earth asteroids surpassed 40,000, with roughly 10,000 of those discovered in just the last three years.
Should You Worry?
Short answer: no. The largest near-Earth objects — those capable of global-scale damage — have largely already been found and tracked. The ongoing work now focuses on the mid-sized population (100–300 meters across), which is harder to detect but well within the scope of current and upcoming survey technology, including the upcoming NASA NEO Surveyor mission planned for a 2027 launch.
The next time you see an asteroid headline, check the actual numbers. More often than not, “close approach” means millions of miles away — and that’s a very good thing.
