An asteroid with the potential to obliterate a city will narrowly miss Earth next week, scientists have revealed.

Astronomers say the space rock, called 2026 JH2, is up to four times the size of a London bus and will get 'as close as you can without hitting'.

It is expected to zoom by our planet at an estimated distance of around 56,000 miles (90,000km) late on Monday night.

This is exceptionally close – the equivalent of just a quarter of the distance between us and the moon.

Despite having enough mass to wipe out a city it was only identified by observatories a few days ago, raising concerns about the early detection of potentially hazardous asteroids.

Thankfully, simulations suggest there is no chance of an impact for at least the next 100 years.

Estimates place the size of the space rock between 52 and 115ft (16 and 35 metres) in diameter, and as it passes by it will be travelling at 5.17 miles per second relative to Earth.

'It's the kind of thing that would ruin a city quite efficiently, if it hit,' Mark Norris, from the University of Lancashire, told New Scientist.

The size of the asteroid is an estimate based on the amount of light reflecting off its surface, which means that measurements cannot be entirely certain.

If the asteroid is made of a particularly dark or unreflective material, then it could be nearer to the higher end of the estimate range or potentially even larger.

However, even at the lower end of its estimated range, the asteroid still carries a huge destructive potential.

Experts say if 2026 JH2 did strike Earth, it would cause an event comparable to the Chelyabinsk meteor.

In 2013, an 18–metre (59ft) meteor exploded over the city of Chelyabinsk in Russia, near the border with Kazakhstan.

The resulting explosion was 30 times more powerful than the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima, producing a shockwave that travelled twice around the world.

Directly beneath the explosion, 28 miles (45km) above the ground, the heat was so intense that people were left with burns and retinal damage.

Around 1,500 people were injured and over 3,600 homes were damaged, even though only 0.05 per cent of the original rock made it to the ground.

With a potential size up to 35 metres (115ft) in diameter, 2026 JH2 has the potential to be even more destructive – possibly even ranking it as a 'city killer' size asteroid.

However, although the asteroid will pass extremely close to the planet, it poses no threat whatsoever to Earth.

Thanks to careful study by the network of planetary defence telescopes, astronomers are able to make very precise calculations of asteroids' orbits.

While asteroid 2026 JH2 will be too faint to see with the naked eye, it may be visible through amateur telescopes under dark sky conditions.

It is currently around 1.8 million miles (three million km) from Earth in the constellation of Ursa Major.

Earlier this year, NASA's head of planetary defence revealed there are still tens of thousands of 'city killer' asteroids that remain undetected.

Dr Kelly Fast, who leads efforts to find and track near–Earth objects like asteroids and comets, admitted they are still looking for around 15,000 mid–sized celestial bodies which could pose a threat.

While an impact from one of these – defined by being at least 140 metres wide – would likely not destroy the planet, they could 'really cause regional damage', she said.

And it turns out Earth still has no way to deflect one if we realised it was heading straight for us. 

In 2022, NASA deliberately sent a spacecraft called Dart 6.8 million miles into space to crash into a mini moon called Dimorphos at 14,000mph in a bid to alter its orbit.

This mission was hailed as a success, paving the way for defending our planet by knocking incoming asteroids off their set path towards Earth.

But Dr Nancy Chabot, a planetary scientist at Johns Hopkins University who led that mission, said there are no other Dart–like spacecraft ready to launch if an asteroid was suddenly found to be on a collision course with Earth.

'Dart was a great demonstration,' she said. 'But we don't have [another] sitting around ready to go if there was a threat that we needed to use it for.'