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Why don't we know for sure that an impact won't occur?
Scientists are only able to give a probability that a NEO will hit the Earth because of unavoidable uncertainties. We can calculate where a NEO will go for many hundreds of years into the future if we know its exact position, speed, size and rotation. In most cases, however, these can only be measured to a certain accuracy depending on the number of observations and how far away the object is from Earth. The best measurements are made by radar but can only be achieved when a NEO is close to our planet.
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Can radar be used to search for NEOs?
How do we search for NEOs?
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