A space rock roughly the size of a bus has skimmed past at just 44,000 km, a mere whisker in cosmic terms. As as means of comparison, the Moon is 384,400 km away from Earth.
Asteroid 2012 TC4 flew so near us that it offered a good chance for observation.
The rock’s next pass is predicted to happen in 2079, so scientists need to work out how much closer to Earth the asteroid might come then.