What would REALLY happen if an asteroid hit New York

In the last few months alone, astronomers have alerted the world to several'close shaves' as asteroids of varying sizes whizzed past Earth. While the objects have all flown by at a safe distance, there are still hundreds of thousands that have yet to be identified, causing many people to wonder, 'what if?' Using data from NASA observations of near-Earth objects, a new study has revealed the terrifying scenarios that would take place if a massive space-rock were to slam into a major US city – causing millions of deaths, and injuries for hundreds of miles around. In February, a 328-foot wide object dubbed 2013FK safely passed by Earth, and is set to come around again in 2021. If an asteroid the size of 2013FK were to slam into New York City, there would be more than 2.5 million casualties, according to the study Researchers analyzed more than 36,000 close approaches from NASA's near-Earth object (NEO) database to find out the largest – and closest – to pass by in recent times. The InsuranceQuotes team used an impact calculator to determine the energy of the NEOs, and then converted this into megatons of TNT.