(NEW YORK) — A rare asteroid will soon be visible to the naked eye in a rare celestial event, according to astronomers.

Asteroid 99942 Apophis – named after the Egyptian deity of chaos, darkness and fire – is expected to safely pass close to Earth on April 13, 2029, according to NASA.

The asteroid will pass within roughly 20,000 miles of Earth – nearly 12 times closer than the moon’s average distance from Earth, and closer than many satellites in geosynchronous orbit – making it one one of the closest approaches ever recorded for an object if its size and a “very rare event,” according to NASA.

The approach will be visible to observers on the ground in the Eastern Hemisphere, weather permitting, according to NASA. It will be close enough that sky-watchers won’t need a telescope or binoculars to see it, astronomers say.

When Apophis was first discovered in 2004, it was labeled a potentially hazardous asteroid because of the possibility that it could impact Earth in 2029, 2036 or 2068, according to NASA.

After closely tracking the asteroid and its orbit using optical telescopes and ground-based radar, astronomers are now confident that there is no risk of Apophis impacting Earth for at least 100 years.

The Earth’s gravitational pull could change the asteroid’s orbit around the sun as it passes in 2029, making the orbit slightly larger or the orbital period slightly longer, but the risk of impact with Earth will remain the same, NASA says. Its close passage will also afford astronomers around the world the opportunity to learn more about the asteroid.

Apophis is the Greek name for the Egyptian god known as Apep. The name was proposed by the astronomers who discovered the asteroid: Roy Tucker, David Tholen and Fabrizio Bernardi of the Kitt Peak National Observatory near Tucson, Arizona.

The asteroid is a relic of the early solar system from about 4.6 billion years ago, made of leftover raw material that was never part of a planet or moon, according to NASA. Though its exact size and shape is unknown, it has a mean diameter of about 1,115 feet and a long axis of at least 1,480 feet.

Apophis’ surface is weathered due to eons of exposure to space weather, including solar wind and cosmic rays, according to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Observatories around the world and in space will observe the asteroid’s historic approach to Earth in order to better understand its physical properties.

NASA has redirected a spacecraft to rendezvous with Apophis shortly after its close approach in 2029, while the European Space Agency is sending a spacecraft to study it.

When the April 2029 flyby occurs, Apophis will become a member of the “Apollo” group, the family of asteroids that cross Earth’s orbit but that themselves have orbits around the sun that are wider than the Earth’s, according to the ESA.

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(WASHINGTON) — A federal appeals court on Tuesday halted a criminal contempt inquiry into former Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem and other officials for last year’s deportation of more than 200 Venezuelans to El Salvador’s CECOT mega-prison, marking the second time in less than a year that the probe has been frozen. 

A divided panel of judges on the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals ordered an end to the inquiry, concluding that the probe into whether the officials knowingly defied a court order with the deportations “encroaches on the autonomy” of the executive branch. 

The Trump administration, in March 2025, invoked the Alien Enemies Act — an 18th century wartime authority used to remove noncitizens with little-to-no due process — to deport two planeloads of alleged migrant gang members by arguing that the Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua is a “hybrid criminal state” that is invading the United States.

U.S. District Judge James Boasberg issued a temporary restraining order and ordered that the planes be turned around, but Justice Department attorneys said his oral instructions directing the flight to be returned were defective, and the deportations proceeded as planned.

Boasberg subsequently sought contempt proceedings against the government for deliberately defying his order, and had concluded that “probable cause exists to find the government in criminal contempt” — but his inquiry was frozen by the same appeals court last year.

When Boasberg attempted to continue with his probe within the confines of the court’s order, the Trump administration filed an interlocutory appeal to stop the investigation outright. 

“The district court proposes to probe high-level Executive Branch deliberations about matters of national security and diplomacy,” Judge Neomi Rao, one of two Trump appointees on the panel who ruled in favor of the government, wrote in Tuesday’s order. “These proceedings are a clear abuse of discretion, as the district court’s order said nothing about transferring custody of the plaintiffs and therefore lacks the clarity to support criminal contempt based on the transfer of custody.” 

Judge J. Michelle Childs dissented from the majority and argued that Boasberg should have the latitude to proceed with basic fact-finding into the deportations. 

“There is no question that there could be much to fear in a factual inquiry about the actions of potential contemnors who may have defied a court order. However, that does not mean that this court must intervene to end a criminal case before it begins, even for the Executive Branch,” she wrote. 

In a sharply worded dissent, she argued that “the fate of our democratic republic” depends on whether courts can properly investigate and punish contempt.  

“Without the contempt power, the rule of law is an illusion, a theory that stands upon shifting sands,” she said. 

The Venezuelan nationals were ultimately released to their home country from CECOT in a prisoner swap last July.

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