Asteroid on ‘collision course' with Earth burns up above far northeastern Russia

A small asteroid sped toward Earth before it burned out above far northeastern Russia on Tuesday night, sparking a natural light show for residents in the remote corner of the planet, officials said.

The flying space rock, which was less than 70 centimeters (27.5 inches) wide, had "been spotted on a collision course" with Earth, the European Space Agency said earlier Tuesday, predicting that the impact would be "harmless."

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A "nice fireball in the sky over northern Siberia" was reportedly spotted at 5:15 p.m. CET (11:15 a.m. ET) by residents in the Russian republic of Yakutia, the space agency said.

NASA called the event a "harmless fireball" and credited the University of Arizona’s Bok telescope for having first spotted its approach.

There were no immediate reports of damage or injuries from the asteroid, which was dubbed C0WEPC5.

“Thanks to observations from astronomers around the world, our alert system was able to predict this impact to within +/- 10 seconds,” the agency said.

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