NASA is keeping an eye on the sky for any asteroids or other objects headed our way, but how can they stop them if the worse case scenario happens?

A huge asteroid is about to pass so close to our planet that it will actually be closer to us than the Moon.

The “potentially hazardous” space rock is called 2019 SP3 and it will be zooming past Earth today.

Nasa has estimated that the asteroid could be up to 33 metres long and has classified it as potentially hazardous, The Sun reported.

The space agency said: “Potentially Hazardous Asteroids (PHAs) are currently defined based on parameters that measure the asteroid’s potential to make threatening close approaches to the Earth.

“Specifically, all asteroids with a minimum orbit intersection distance (MOID) of 0.05 au or less are considered PHAs.”

Asteroid 2019 SP3 will whizz past us at over 30577km/h and should miss Earth by 372,868km.

In the grand scheme of space this isn’t a large distance at all, so Nasa has flagged it as a “close approach”.

Any fast moving space object that comes within around 4.65 million miles is considered to be “potentially hazardous” by cautious space organisations.

Asteroid 2019 SP3 should be flying past Earth on the morning of October 3.

The asteroid is a similar size to the Chelyabinsk meteor, which exploded over Russia back in 2013.

Its impact smashed windows and injured more than 1,000 people.

Experts did not predict the impact, sparking concern that Earth could be surprised with a more devastating incident in the future.

In other space news, mysterious Planet X may be a black hole that’s ‘10 times heavier than Earth but the size of a bowling ball’ on the edge of our Solar System.

Scientists recently discovered a “Super-Earth” 31 light-years away that humans could one day colonise.

And, distant planets may host even more life than we have here on Earth, according to one shock study.

What do you think of this huge space rock? Let us know in the comments...

This story was originally published in The Sun and is reprinted with permission.