I knew all those hours spent at the arcade back in the day would come in handy some day.
Posted on 11/28/2007 11:14:45 AM PST by Freeport
When it comes to 22-million-ton asteroids, the small stuff, it turns out, can make a huge difference in a potentially disastrous path toward Earth.
Using limited observations and lots of high-end computer modeling, astronomers have gotten a better handle on the limitations of asteroid-track forecasting in a new study of a potentially threatening asteroid called Apophis. In this high-stakes game of Whack-a-Cosmic-Mole, just knowing exactly what it is you don't know can be useful.
Apophis' chance of hitting our planet in 2029 is now slim to none, but astronomers will have to wait four to six years before they can predict what it might do during a second pass in 2036. A team of scientists arrived at the conclusion after accounting for small influences like the solar wind, gravitational drag of smaller asteroids and human error.
The rock is between 690 and 1080 feet (210 and 330 meters) wide. Until better measurements lower the uncertainties, its predicted path could be severely off, potentially thwarting proactive efforts to change its course.
Uncertain future
In 2004, astronomers gave Apophis a frightening one-in-37 chance of striking the Earth in 2029, which later measurements from Puerto Rico's giant Arecibo radio observatory knocked down to a one in 45,000 likelihood.
Apophis is expected to make a comfortably distant encounter of about 30 million miles (47.9 million kilometers) with Earth in 2036. But its first path-bending pass in 2029—about three Earth diameters of our home—and other unknowns could greatly alter the asteroid's second approach seven years later.
(Excerpt) Read more at space.com ...
Ignore them till they go away?
Since we as humans can heat up the entire Earth by barbecuing in our backyards, maybe we can divert the asteroids by pointing a bunch of fans skyward.
I knew all those hours spent at the arcade back in the day would come in handy some day.
Perhaps we can plant really tall trees. And swat it out of the way. :)
I hope these aren't the same people investigating Global Warming.
And when lefty stars implode.
Capture it; mine it; retire old astronauts.
for when your rogue roid’s fire up......
Improve their self esteem?
Well, by Jove, I wonder what ‘he’ (Jupiter) has to say about this.
Jupiter’s gravity is what slings asteriods into these wildly eccentric orbits.
Predicting how close it will come twenty-plus years from now is like predicting where a ‘message in a bottle’ will end up if you throw it off a cruise ship.
You got to love it, there probably isn’t one person out there that wouldn’t take a chance on the lottery if the odds were only 1 in 45,000.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.