The Minor Planet Centre considers this asteroid a "Potentially hazardous object" because its diameter is bigger than 100 metres and it will approaches less than 19'5 times the distance from Earth to the moon.
The ICCUB (IEEC-UB) researcher, J. M. Carrasco has said on Catalunya Ràdio, (Audio, news)07/04/2017:
"An object like this could be dangerous if it collided with the Earth. It has 650 metres and it could survive an entry to the atmosphere, but the distance is very large, it will pass at a distance of near 5 times the distance from the Earth to the Moon, and do not exist an impact risk. "
Small asteroids pass within this distance of Earth several times each week, but this upcoming close approach is the closest by any known asteroid of this size, or larger, since asteroid Toutatis, a five-kilometer asteroid, which approached within about four lunar distances in September 2004. The next known encounter of an asteroid of comparable size will occur in 2027 when the 800-meter-wide asteroid 1999 AN10 will fly by at one lunar distance, about 380,000 kilometers.
The asteroid will approach Earth from the direction of the sun and will become visible in the night sky after April 19. It is predicted to brighten to about magnitude 11, when it could be visible in small optical telescopes for one or two nights before it fades as the distance from Earth rapidly increases.
