Apparently, we were in danger without knowing it... sort of. Those interested in astronomy, or those that have looked into whatever doomsday theories have been popping up over the past decade will have noticed a trend for a big, 1060 feet wide asteroid named Apophis to occur in more than one instance. According to astronomers from NASA, that asteroid has now been wiped from the list of threats. It was first spotted in 2004, where it was calculated to have a 2.7% chance of striking the planet. This was later lowered to 1 in 270,000, and the asteroid has now been entirely wiped from NASA's list.
There's a longer article below, with more information on it.
As far as I understand, the recent revisions show that even within their margin, the asteroid is beyond what they feel would have been a serious threat. I remember seeing news about this come up when it got a high threat rating for a bit as well as the size of the asteroid. The relevant part of the article that sums up why NASA feels it is no longer a concern (as well as a snippet of another object that will be coming close):
Quote:
Yeomans said now the asteroid, named after an evil Egyptian mythical serpent, won't get closer than 19,400 miles. That's still the closest approach asteroid watchers have seen for a rock this large. And when astronomers got a closer look they noticed it was about 180 feet larger than they thought, but not a threat.
...
On Feb. 15, a small asteroid, only 130-feet wide, will come close to Earth, about 17,000 miles above the equator. That's so close it will come between our planet and some of the more distant satellites that circle the globe. But it will miss Earth.
Considering our position in the solar system and the asteroid belt between mars and jupiter, it is not a matter of "if an asteroid gets in collision path to earth" but "when will an asteroid get in collision path to earth".
I found some interesting data on the subject matter. The relation of the asteroid diameter to the amount of destruction it is supposed to bring. An asteroid of upto 10 meters diameter would burn itself up during its journey though the atmosphere. A 50 meters one would cause local damage while one of nearly 10 km diameter would mark a global catastrophe and end of all human development so far.
The second website goes much deeper into the subject, keeping in view the composition of the object, the velocity of impact, how deep crater it will create and some more inferences.
Its all a Chequer-board of Nights and Days
Where Destiny with Men for Pieces plays
Hither and thither moves, and mates, and slays
And one by one back in the Closet lays
Reading that, well, here's hoping we never get a behemoth of 6 miles. I wonder if we'd ever get to the point to actually develop some way of defending against these things in the future, or if it'll just come down to people getting the hell off the planet?
Reading that, well, here's hoping we never get a behemoth of 6 miles. I wonder if we'd ever get to the point to actually develop some way of defending against these things in the future, or if it'll just come down to people getting the hell off the planet?
There are already a lot of ideas how asteroids/comets could be deflected. And there are research programs that attempt to identify dangerous objects. The problem is that most of the strategies requrie a lot of time while it is possible that a dangerous object is detected when not enough time is left.
NEOShield is the most up to date international project that looks into effective methods.
Reading that, well, here's hoping we never get a behemoth of 6 miles. I wonder if we'd ever get to the point to actually develop some way of defending against these things in the future, or if it'll just come down to people getting the hell off the planet?
Getting people off the planet and going where? Space is a hellish, enormous environment that our current level of technology is ill-suited to navigate. Based on how hellish and enormous it is, and the fact that the laws of physics are continually spoiling our fun in that regard, we may never have a sufficient level of technology to effectively navigate it. If a planet-killing asteroid was discovered headed towards us tomorrow, there's no way we could A) evacuate enough people to make a difference; B) go anywhere worthwhile with them if we could, or C) survive for very long afterwards.
Personally, I'd rather die a quick death from an impact than suffer a more prolonged, but equally certain, death in space.
And as Mr. Fancypants said, there are already theories regarding how we could deflect or redirect a dangerous asteroid. Some of them require technology that isn't quite mature enough for the task yet, but there are others. The biggest problem is actually detecting them while there's enough time left to actually try and do anything about it.
Politics and finances are the other obstacles, as far as I see it. I have no doubt that if we discovered a dangerous asteroid headed towards us, and we had enough time to try and do something about it, if all of the people and resources in the world were pooled together we'd have a very good chance at saving the planet.
I have many doubts, however, as to the level of cooperation that would occur even in such an extreme situation.
As for the asteroid in this story, this was always a case of the media blowing things out of proportion. Scientists have never been genuinely concerned about Apophis hitting the Earth; they merely pointed out that it was a slim possibility. If there has ever been greater support for the old axiom, "journalists =/= scientists", I've not seen it.
The fact that the already-insane doomsday proponents latched onto it isn't particularly surprising either. You're talking about one of the same groups of people who believed that the Planet Nibiru was going to pass us by and exchange alien visitors as it destroyed us.
I think it would be a practically possible option to hit a gigantic [5 km or more] asteroid with a missile containing a hydrogen bomb in the space. This would disintegrate it into parts which would burn out with atmospheric friction, or at least minimise their damage possibility from global to local.
Compared to an atomic bomb, the hydrogen bomb produces hundreds of times more energetic explosion with a comparatively very less ratio of radioactive emission.
The real question is, will this turn into another nuclear weapons race with russia and america launching more and more nuclear armed satellites targeted more at their rival countries' capitals than a possible incoming asteroid?
And yes, as Mr Matt says, it is IMPOSSIBLE to evacuate the earth's populace on such a large scale, alongwith so much food supply, and knowledge bank for all the human development so far, the zoological and botanical specimens for such an infinitely diverse ecology. Then surviving in the space itself for so long and also finding a planet which we can infect and infest with these and settle there.
Or are you talking of returning here again after the global dust cloud starts settling down again?
Its all a Chequer-board of Nights and Days
Where Destiny with Men for Pieces plays
Hither and thither moves, and mates, and slays
And one by one back in the Closet lays
Last edited by Asheekay; January 15th, 2013 at 01:22 PM.
I think it would be a practically possible option to hit a gigantic [5 km or more] asteroid with a missile containing a hydrogen bomb in the space. This would disintegrate it into parts which would burn out with atmospheric friction, or at least minimise their damage possibility from global to local.
Compared to an atomic bomb, the hydrogen bomb produces hundreds of time more energetic with a comparatively very less ratio of radioactive emission.
The real question is, will this turn into another nuclear weapons race with russia and america launching more and more nuclear armed satellites targeted more at their rival countries' capitals than a possible incoming asteroid?
And yes, as Mr Matt says, it is IMPOSSIBLE to evacuate the earth's populace on such a large scale, alongwith so much food supply, and knowledge bank for all the human development so far, the zoological and botanical specimens for such an infinitely diverse ecology. Then surviving in the space itself for so long and also finding a planet which we can infect and infest with these and settle there.
Or are you talking of returning here again after the global dust cloud starts settling down again?
Putting nukes in space is indeed dangerous, but that problem could be avoided by giving an international agency like ESA control of the vehicle while the owners of the bombs retain the codes for arming the bomb.
As for blowing up a 5km asteroid - you might be able to blow up a comet, but an asteroids are probably rather solid. So you'd have to drill a hole to its core. In the case of a very large asteroid the remaining pieces could then easily be large enough to cause substanital problems on their own.
That's why the general idea is to detonate nukes on or near the surface of an asteroid. You avoid the complex drilling and use the blast to change the object's orbit. In the case of comets parts of the surface would evaporate, so you'd get an impulse from that as well.
The same principle can also in theory be used as propulsion for spacecraft.
I think it would be a practically possible option to hit a gigantic [5 km or more] asteroid with a missile containing a hydrogen bomb in the space. This would disintegrate it into parts which would burn out with atmospheric friction, or at least minimise their damage possibility from global to local.
Compared to an atomic bomb, the hydrogen bomb produces hundreds of times more energetic explosion with a comparatively very less ratio of radioactive emission.
Unfortunately, as Mr. Fancypants says, while your average 20MT thermonuclear warhead would cause catastrophic damage to a city or an ecosphere, and would probably be very effective against small comets too, when faced with a 10km-wide ball of solid rock and iron it'd find much stiffer resistance. Even drilling into the asteroid would cause, at best, the asteroid to break in two or three similarly-dangerous parts.
Another issue is that nuclear weapons function much differently in space than they do in an atmosphere. Much of the damage they cause on Earth - the enormous fireball, the huge shockwave - would not occur in the vacuum of space. At best, a direct hit from a nuclear warhead against a large asteroid would cause a crater and some glassing. At worst, it'd cause no damage at all.
The best option is to slow it down or deflect it. One of the best and most promising theories I've heard involves placing powerful engines on the surface of the asteroid and changing its course non-violently. Provided it's not a super-huge asteroid, this would be a viable option. Unfortunately this requires engine technologies currently beyond our capabilities; fusion rockets for example, could potentially do it, but we don't have fusion power yet - and we may never have it. The same technology, on a less efficient scale, could potentially be achieved with regular fission, but there are doubts as to how powerful such a drive would be.
The ultimate theory, based on the above, would be to manoeuvre the thing into an Earth orbit. That way it could be hugely beneficial to future space programs - materials could be mined in-orbit, the asteroid itself could be used as a base of operations, etc. Not only would it no longer be dangerous, but it'd be hugely useful.
I'm dubious about relying on nuclear weapons for destroying asteroids, though. Like Mr. Fancypants says, using the blasts to alter its course would be more effective, similar to the concept of Project Orion. Though, it'd take a lot of nukes.
Quote:
The real question is, will this turn into another nuclear weapons race with russia and america launching more and more nuclear armed satellites targeted more at their rival countries' capitals than a possible incoming asteroid?
This is the other concern with relying on nuclear weapons for space defence, of course - space defence could quite easily become Earth offence. However, I can't really see armed satellites making matters much worse than they already are, what with the efficiency of modern ICBMs and the unpredictable positioning of nuclear submarines. Particularly as satellites can be tracked much more easily than nuclear submarines, and ASAT missiles are quite effective these days.
Mr. Fancypants' idea is a good one - give control of the installation to an independent agency.
Last edited by Mr. Matt; January 16th, 2013 at 03:52 AM.
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Giant asteroid no longer a threat to Earth 
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