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Ammon News - he large space rock is considered a 'near Earth object' due to the close approach it will make with our planet.

'potentially hazardous' asteroid is set to hurtle past Earth today, according to NASA.

The large space rock is considered a 'near Earth object' due to the close approach it will make with our planet this week.

NASA is keeping a close eye on the asteroid which is estimated to be 189 metres or 623 feet wide - that's almost twice the size of Big Ben at 316 feet.

It's called Asteroid 2017 XC62 and should shoot past us at 9,500 miles per hour on Monday.

While NASA has labelled the asteroid 'potentially hazardous' due to its close proximity to Earth, it's still expected to stay a distance of 4.4 million miles away.

The moon is only about 238,900 miles from us, so that's quite the distance.

However, NASA considers anything passing near Earth's orbit a Near-Earth Object (NEO) and monitor whether they're on a collision course with our planet.

Any fast-moving space object that comes within 4.65 million miles is considered to be "potentially hazardous".

That's because any change in their direction could be a disaster for Earth.

In November last year, a spacecraft was launched by NASA to crash deliberately into an asteroid for the first time in history.

DART, or Double Asteroid Redirection Test, is a pilot of a new technology to prevent future asteroid collisions such as the type that wiped out the dinosaurs.
*dailyrecord