A team of physicists from the Olin College of Engineering has calculated the likelihood of an individual being killed by an asteroid impact, finding it to be slightly higher than the odds of being struck by lightning. The study, which analysed data for ten potentially fatal events, including asteroid strike, lightning strike, and car crashes, reveals a one in 156,000 chance of death by asteroid, compared to one in 163,000 for lightning.
The researchers used NASA data to estimate that there are 22,800 near-Earth objects (NEOs) measuring 140 metres or larger, and that an impact would kill one in 1,000 people. They found a 0.0091 per cent annual chance of such an asteroid hitting Earth, translating to a one in 156 chance of a collision occurring during any given person's lifetime.
Lead author Professor Carrie Nugent said: 'I think most people know that asteroids can hit the Earth. But, most people have no context on how often that happens. We compared the probability of a > 140-meter asteroid or comet hitting the Earth over a human lifetime with the probability of other rare, preventable events that may happen to a person over their lifetime, like car crashes and wildlife attacks.'
The study also found that you are more than 500 times more likely to die in a car crash (one in 273) and significantly more likely to die from carbon monoxide poisoning (one in 714). Flu, while similarly deadly to an asteroid impact, is far more likely to occur. Dry sand hole collapse, though almost always fatal, has nearly a one in one million chance of occurring in a human lifetime.
The findings come after Asteroid 2024 YR4 briefly had a 3.1 per cent chance of hitting Earth on December 22, 2032, before its impact odds were lowered to zero. The pre-print paper is due to be published in the Planetary Science Journal.
