While the idea of sending a nuclear weapon into space to stop a potentially deadly asteroid sounds like fiction thanks to movies like Armageddon, it is one of the options available to scientists.
NASA has revealed which countries could be hit if a "city killer" asteroid strikes Earth with a map of the risk corridor.
Dr Robin George Andrews, a science writer, said on X: "I've often [been] told you need 10 years or more to build, plan and execute an asteroid deflection mission.
A carefully executed explosion close to the surface of the asteroid would be carried out in the hope that the rock shatters into smaller fragments that would burn up in the atmosphere.
He suggested that scientists may "break an awkward taboo" of using a nuclear weapon against 2024 YR4 "which would provide a bigger punch than DART".
