Got your bucket list ready? The date for Armageddon has been set, and it's not going to happen in 2012.
That's according to Russian scientists who claim they know the exact day asteroid Apophis is most likely to hit the Earth.
If you were born on April 13, plan your biggest party for the year 2036.
"Apophis will approach Earth at a distance of 37,000-38,000 kilometers on April 13, 2029," Professor Leonid Sokolov of the St. Petersburg State University told Ria Novosti.
"Its likely collision with Earth may occur on April 13, 2036." You might have noticed he used the word "may".
Asteroid 99942 Apophis was first discovered to be in the Earth's impact zone back in 2004, and at roughly 300m wide, is estimated to be able to hit the Earth with the force equivalent to somewhere around two Krakatoas.
More sketchy science puts Australia well out of the path of possible destruction - Apophis could land anywhere in a streak that runs from the Middle East through the tip of South America to the west coast of Africa, according to a paper delivered to the 2007 Planetary Defense Conference.
Which is not to say we won't feel its impact. A simulation tool devised by the University of Southampton in the UK shows that, depending on where it hits, it could cause up to 10 million deaths.
There's several reasons not to panic, though.
One is the fact that it will probably break up and smaller bits of it will bombard the Earth over the next few years. The other is that we've got a bit of warning.
In 2029, when it swings close by the Earth, we'll find out whether Apophis has nailed a gravitational keyhole that will drag it into our orbit seven years later.
The gap is just 600m wide, so there's a fair chance it won't happen.
"If it goes through what we call a keyhole during that close Earth approach (in 2029) ... then it will indeed be perturbed just right so that it will come back and smack Earth on April 13, 2036," Donald Yeomans, head of NASA's Near-Earth Object Program Office, told The Christian Science Monitor, before adding that the chance was "minuscule".
But that slight chance it will happen - at one stage predicted to be somewhere in the two to three per cent range - is enough to get at least the Russians working on a solution.
"Our task is to consider various alternatives and develop scenarios and plans of action depending on the results of further observations of Apophis," Prof Sokolov said.
Disappointingly, the head of Russia's space agency said back in 2009 that there "won't be any nuclear explosions".
"Everything will be done according to the laws of physics," Anatoly Perminov said. "We will examine all of this."
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www.news.com.au/technology/asteroid-apophis-we-know-when-it-will-hit-say-russian-scientists-if-it-..It is proposed that if scientists know an asteroid is about to hit the Earth, then this information should be kept from the general public