Apophis, an asteroid with an estimated diameter of almost three football fields (270m), will make its close approach to Earth this week.

Slooh Space Camera will cover its near-approach on January 9, with several live shows on Slooh.com, free to the public, starting at 4 pm.

This is not the first time Apophis has whizzed past Earth.

Discovered in 2004 by astronomers at the Kitt Peak National Observatory, Apophis was calculated at the time to have a 1 in 45 chance of it hitting the Earth in 2029.

Thankfully, improved prediction models have eliminated those concerns, but there still is a chance Apophis could impact Earth sometime in the distant future, perhaps as soon as 2036.