Welcome back to Cool Stuff Daily, where we take a look at some of the weird, wild, and wonderfully nerdy corners of science, tech, and history.

I'm Reddy Rizzou, joined alongside Marcus Path on today's episode.

We take a look at that city killer asteroid that might be heading towards the moon and should we be blowing it up?

Some scientists think that may be an option.

Here's another story from ZME science and author Mahai Andre.

A city block-sized asteroid named 2024 YR4 is hurtling through space and it has our moon in its sights.

Asteroid 2024 YR4 caused quite the stir last year when astronomers calculated a 3% chance of hitting Earth.

Since then, the trajectory models have been refined and it's no longer believed to have a chance

of hitting Earth, but it does have a 4% chance of hitting the Moon in December of 2032.

This would be far from the first sizable asteroid to hit the moon, but it could be problematic

for us. The impact could kick up a massive cloud of lunar rock and dust. Some of this debris would reach low Earth orbit,

creating a major hazard for vital satellites and even asteroids working in space.

So astronomers have an idea that kind of sounds like something out of a movie.

What if we blow it up?

The idea is described in a yet-to-be peer-reviewed study

spearheaded by Brent Barbie from the

Department of Aerospace Engineering at the University of Maryland and a flight dynamics engineer

in NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center. The 40-page study essentially reads as a blueprint for

dealing with asteroids that can become a problem. Although this particular asteroid

is headed for the moon, the same approach could be deployed for an asteroid headed for Earth,

making it an important test. When an asteroid threatens your planet, or in this case your planet's

largest satellite, you have two basic choices. Push it or pulverize it. The first option,

...