NASA is preparing for the passage of an enormous asteroid named after the Egyptian God of Chaos Apophis.

The massive space rock will pass the Earth closely enough to enable billions of people to witness its flight.

In fact, the path travelled by the 340 metre asteroid skirts the Earth so narrowly that NASA once feared Apophis would collide with our planet.

Thankfully, we won’t share the dinosaurs’ fate this time, as Apophis will miss the Earth by a tiny astronomical margin of 19,000 miles.

Even though the human species could probably survive the crash landing of a monster like Apophis, the impact could wipe out a city like London and would leave a three-mile crater in its wake.

The whole human race would be endangered if an asteroid wider than half a mile were to collide with the Earth, as the sheer volume of debris dispersed through the air by such behemoths could block sunlight and prevent plant growth.

Apophis is due to pass the earth in ten years’ time, on Friday April 13 2029.

Apophis recently came under discussion at NASA’s yearly Planetary Defence Conference, which also witnessed the simulation of an asteroid apocalypse conducted by scientists and disaster planners so as to rehearse emergency responses.

Paul Chodas, director of NASA’s Centre for Near Earth Objects Studies (CNEOS) SAID: ‘Apophis is a representative of about 2,000 currently known Potentially Hazardous Asteroids (PHAs).

‘By observing Apophis during its 2029 flyby, we will gain important scientific knowledge that could one day be used for planetary defence.

It was only in 2013 that scientists breathed a sigh of relief and confirmed that Apophis would miss the Earth.

Don Yeomans, manager of NASA’s Near-Earth Object Programme Office said: ‘We have effectively ruled out the possibility of an Earth impact by Apophis in 2036.

‘The impact odds as they stand now are less than one in a million, which makes us comfortable saying we can effectively rule out an Earth impact in 2036. Our interest in asteroid Apophis will essentially be for its scientific interest for the foreseeable future.’

Nonetheless, ‘the ‘April 13, 2029, flyby of asteroid Apophis will be ‘one for the record books’ because of how narrowly it will miss the Earth.

Marina Brozovic, a radar scientist at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena said: ‘The Apophis close approach in 2029 will be an incredible opportunity for science.

‘We’ll observe the asteroid with both optical and radar telescopes. With radar observations, we might be able to see surface details that are only a few meters in size.’