Social media has been running rampant with stories about a creepy skull-shaped asteroid that will supposedly pass by Earth on Halloween night, but according to NASA, that's not quite true.

Recent reports floating around indicate an asteroid the shape of a skull will fly by and miss Earth by about 300,000 miles on Halloween this year, but that actually happened three years ago in 2015. CNN reports that NASA says the asteroid will only come within 25 million miles of Earth this year and will be its closest on November 11, well after Halloween. On top of that, the asteroid will still be too far away to see what it looks like.

skull shaped asteroid halloween earth
Asteroid 2015 TB145 (NASA)
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"This time it's not coming close enough (to Earth) to be any larger than a dot of light," Paul Chodas, manager of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory Center for Near Earth Object Studies, told CNN.

The 2015 TB145 asteroid was discovered to be about 2,000 feet in diameter with a skull-like look to it, but NASA says that could have all changed over time as the asteroid smashes into other objects and breaks apart.

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