A newly tracked asteroid roughly 160 metres (525 feet) wide could strike Earth on 19 February, with northern Scandinavia among the regions inside a preliminary impact corridor, astronomers said on Tuesday. The estimated collision probability is 1 in 36 — high enough to prompt emergency planning, though scientists stress that a miss remains overwhelmingly more likely.
The object, provisionally designated 2026 UV7, was detected on 24 October by a Finnish survey telescope. A new orbit calculation released by the Norrvik Observatory outside Kiruna puts the possible impact zone across a 780-kilometre (485-mile) swathe, from the Norwegian Sea through northern Sweden towards Finland. “We have a real object and a real risk, not a prediction that it will hit,” said Matylda Kucharski, an astronomer at Norrvik.
The clock that lost the track
The alarm came after observatory staff traced a software fault that had affected images from 3 October onward. A duplicated correction from the system’s satellite-linked clock shifted image timestamps by 41 seconds; the survey software then split the asteroid’s appearances into separate, apparently unrelated tracks and discarded them as noise.
That gap meant the object was found late, leaving less time to refine its path. Current calculations give a 2.8% impact probability for 19 February, but Kucharski said that number could rise or fall as further observations narrow the orbit. If the asteroid hit land, models suggest a blast capable of severe destruction within roughly 35 kilometres (22 miles); its energy could reach about 300 megatons of TNT.
Officials urged people not to change travel plans or stock supplies. Kalle Kallas-Jürgenson, a spokesperson for Sweden’s Civil Protection Directorate, said the current estimate meant a 97.2% chance of a miss. “There is no immediate danger to the public, and no evacuation is being considered,” he said. Astronomers cautioned that the percentage is not a settled forecast: early risk estimates can move as new measurements arrive.
A narrow window to act
Emergency planners in Sweden, Finland and Norway are discussing how to share observation data and issue alerts if the risk grows. A decision on whether to prepare a regional public-warning plan is expected by 2 November. Scientists say the corridor is a projection of possible orbits, not a line on the ground where impact is certain; several weeks of observations may rule out a collision altogether.
The possible consequences are serious enough to bring deflection options into early discussion, but no mission has been approved. Kucharski said a spacecraft could, in principle, nudge an asteroid’s path if launched in time, yet the short schedule and incomplete orbit make it too soon to recommend a specific response. “Our first job is to measure it properly, night after night,” she said.
The clock fault has also brought a swift government consequence: Sweden’s procurement office suspended the observatory software supplier, VelaTrace Systems, from new state contracts pending a technical review. The company has been asked to explain how the timestamp error passed routine checks. Norrvik says the faulty service has been replaced and its image archive is being reprocessed.
At 03:20 on Monday, the observatory’s repaired system returned its first clean sequence of measurements, adding a fresh point to the asteroid’s path. Staff celebrated the result, Kucharski said, not because the danger had passed, but because the tracking was working again. The next major update is due after a coordinated run of observations on 2 November.
