Posted on 06/28/2017 5:51:02 AM PDT by John W
Throughout its 4.5-billion-year history, Earth has been repeatedly pummelled by space rocks that have caused anything from an innocuous splash in the ocean to species annihilation.
When the next big impact will be, nobody knows.
But the pressure is on to predict—and intercept—its arrival.
"Sooner or later we will get... a minor or major impact," Rolf Densing, who heads the European Space Operations Centre (ESOC) in Darmstadt, Germany, told AFP ahead of International Asteroid Day on Friday.
It may not happen in our lifetime, he said, but "the risk that Earth will get hit in a devastating event one day is very high."
For now, there is little we can do.
And yet, the first-ever mission to crash a probe into a small space rock to alter its trajectory suffered a major setback when European ministers declined in December to fund part of the project.
"We are not ready to defend ourselves" against an Earth-bound object, said Densing. "We have no active planetary defence measures."
Hitherto relegated to the realms of science fiction, tactics could include nuking an incoming asteroid, using lasers to vaporise it, sending a space "tractor" to drag it off course, or bumping it into a new direction.
But first, we need to be able to spot the threat.
Astrophysicists monitoring the risk classify objects into sizes ranging from a few millimetres to behemoths 10 kilometres (6.2 miles) across—the size of rock that wiped out non-avian dinosaurs some 65 million years ago.
The smallest type enter Earth's atmosphere daily, burning up prettily as shooting stars.
The largest occur once every 100 million years, and the next impact could well ring in the end of human civilisation.
But when would it happen?
So far, experts have managed to list more than 90 percent of asteroids in the dino-killing range, and determined that none poses an immediate threat.
A much bigger concern is the whereabouts of millions of asteroids in the 15- to 140-metre (49- to 460-feet) range.
One such object, a 40-metre space rock, caused the largest impact in recent history when it exploded over Tunguska, Siberia, on June 30, 1908—the date on which Asteroid Day is marked.
The blast flattened some 80 million trees over 2,000 sparsely-populated square kilometres (772 square miles)—an area bigger than greater London.
Tunguska-sized events happen, on average, every 300 years or so.
"Imagine that this type of asteroid would fall in a very populated area like... Paris or Germany, I mean this is something that would be really, really a catastrophe," said Nicolas Bobrinsky, programme manager of the European Space Agency's Space Situational Awareness project, which surveys asteroids.
At least the ones it knows of.
The Chelyabinsk impact in 2013, for example, caught everyone unawares.
A once-a-decade category rock of about 20m exploded in the atmosphere over central Russia with the kinetic energy of some 27 Hiroshima bombs.
The resulting shockwave blew out the windows of nearly 5,000 buildings and injured more than 1,200 people.
"Now that we have discovered most of the (asteroids) that are about a kilometre in size and larger, the goal is to discover most of the ones which are (up to) about 140 m," said Patrick Michel, an astrophysicist with France's CNRS research institute.
"This is the threshold—if an object of this size impacts the Earth—for regional damage at the scale of a country or a continent."
Another unknown is long-period comets: wanderers of the Solar System which can take centuries or millennia to orbit the Sun, and whose passage has never been recorded.
Europe is setting up a network of telescopes to provide us with a heads-up.
Scheduled for completion in about two years, it "will scan systematically the sky every night and any asteroid which is coming... would be detected with a warning time of approximately two to three weeks," said Bobrinsky.
This is admittedly "not much, but it's better than what we have now," he added.
At the very least, it would allow for cities to be evacuated, or a shockwave warning to be issued.
"Contrary to all other natural risks that we face on Earth, like tsunamis, earthquakes and things like that, this is the only one that we can predict," Michel said.
What is needed is cooperation between politicians and space agencies—and especially money.
An asteroid deflection system would require "something in the order of 300-400 million euros" (dollars), according to Bobrinsky—a minuscule amount compared to the cost of disaster.
The United Nations declared June 30 International Asteroid Day to raise public awareness about what event organisers describe as "humanity's greatest challenge".
It was initiated by astrophysicist and Queen guitarist Brian May, and moviemaker Grigorij Richters who directed the sci-fi film 51 Degrees North about an asteroid headed for London.
The initiative has the backing of dozens of scientists, astronauts, and celebrities, many of whom will take part in a special 24-hour live broadcast Friday, with round-the-clock asteroid programming by the European, Japanese and American space agencies.
Don’t understand all the hullaballo....
If you just rub some medicated cream on a asteroid, it will eventually go away.....
Okay.
1) Our home is 120 miles North of Yellowstone, home of the National Park and a quaint geological feature commonly referred to as a volcano all by the same name.
2) Past political policies have encouraged an unknown number of criminal/oblique stroke/terrorist individuals and groups to enter this country.
3) This article repeats the prospect of objects of various size striking the earth.
I’m sure there are more threats to my family that I could list, but just considering these three and establishing personal priorities to deal with ‘em, I do believe that I’ll go out and load some more .40S&W.
That new Glock is a sweet shooter, but the thing goes through rounds plumb quick.
LOL. This too shall pass.
Should that be "good old fashioned medicated goo", per Traffic? (An old song, by an old group, you had to be there.)
“So far, experts have managed to list more than 90 percent of asteroids in the dino-killing range, and determined that none poses an immediate threat.”
Civilization-killing asteroids are the very definition of a low-probability, high-impact event. Given that the impact level would be SO high, I think that cooperation between the major space-faring nations, along with some money to actual build advanced detection gear and multi-layered defenses, is warranted. If we spent $5 billion/year between all of the nations, then in 20 years or less we could have some shot at surviving a big asteroid. $5 billion/year between the US, Russia, China, Japan, France, Germany, England, Israel and India is peanuts - more is wasted on stupid studies on why frisbees fly, or how long the penis of some bug is, so let’s spend it on something worthwhile.
100 years or so from now, I don’t worry about a coordinated defense - I think that our technology will be advanced enough that any of the listed nations would be able to destroy or push out of the way ANY asteroid headed our way, provided that there is enough warning (and by then we should have colonies on the Moon, Mars, in low Earth orbit and perhaps in the Asteroid Belt - so we’ll have PLENTY of warning.
No, it is not an immediate problem - that’s why I suggest cooperation and a low level of expenditures. It is in the nature of a life insurance policy for someone who is healthy and in their 20s, and who doesn’t take abnormal risks - probably it is a waste of money (but not much) and if it is needed, then not having it is catastrophic.
No no no...
...Carbon dioxide is...
“Well, let’s see.
So far, asteroids have killed no one as far as we know.
In the 20’th century alone, leftism killed upwards of a 100 million people.
You decide.”
I say that as someone whose family was pretty badly victimized by Russian Leftists - I KNOW that they must be opposed, always and just about everywhere. But I’m also human and don’t wish to keep all of human civilization at risk for want of a few billion bucks a year, split between several nations (us, Russia, China, India, Japan, England, France, Germany and Israel - just my suggestion).
The Moon is a PASSIVE defense measure - it just circles the Earth constantly, and if its gravity well just happens to suck in an asteroid, it does. It does NOT move this way and that to save the Earth, like a planetary Secret Service agent.
Then there's Jupiter, which has saved Earth from annihilation many times.
Yeah, it is asteroids...not ASSteroids. :>)
Islam ranks as the number one problem by my vote. Has communism persisted for over 14 centuries?
“The moon could catch it on its opposite side—and perhaps if hit strong enough, will restore its place in its former (and nearer) orbit.”
Wow, talk about rising sea levels! They’d forget all about global warming or climate change. We’d have to spend $trillions of US taxpayer funds to prevent lunar encroachment. Women and minorities would undoubtedly suffer most.
Certainly the biggest threats to the continuation of the United States of America.
Speaking of .40 S&W, I just picked up 500 rounds for $100 on sale. That is the best price I've ever seen for that round in Winchester white box.
My next priority is finding some .223 in bulk at a similar cost savings.
Yes. I was intending to post merely, "Our biggest challenge is sin," which also includes our inborn predilections. The combination of our sin and "Satan's tricks" is unconquerable by man--we need Christ's work in our stead.
I’m currently at work less than a quarter mile from where that happened.
Cool.
Is there any local artifacts of the occurrence? Sign, business names, landmark, museum?
I would think that Hemorrhoids, not Asteroids, would be a greater concern to billions of people but I could be wrong.
Preparation H - never leave home without it!
If an asteroid is coming, I guess our old “Run, Duck, Cover” isn’t going to work anymore. Gee I miss the old days of just the threat of Soviet nukes hitting us. At least we could strike back.
“Asteroids: Taking Out the Dinosaurs like Putin takes out his enemies”.
I always got shot down in “Zaxxon”.
Revelation 8:
8 The second angel sounded his trumpet, and something like a huge mountain, all ablaze, was thrown into the sea. A third of the sea turned into blood, 9 a third of the living creatures in the sea died, and a third of the ships were destroyed.
Yet another item that the EU will spend trillions on, and still fail.
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