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OH...GEESH...neither is a lightning strike but people are fried yearly. ONCE AGAIN...the MAIN POINT here is we did NOT see it coming!!!!
If you are younger than there is a pretty good chance you'll see this happen in your lifetime....DUCK FAST cause the last hit was in 1908!!!!!
There have been more recent events.
October 8, 2009
Off one of the islands of Indonesia. Energy released from the explosion was estimated to be about 40-50 kilotons of TNT (110 million pounds of TNT, or about three times the energy of the nuclear bomb dropped on Hiroshima). iTWire - Meteor hits above Indonesia
November 20, 2008
Edmonton Canada. Estimated to have weighed (before fragmenting) 1 to 7 tons. The flash lit up the night sky. It's estimated to have been traveling at 134,216 miles per hour (37 miles per second). Fragments have been recovered. CTV Edmonton - Hunt begins for fragments of meteorite - CTV News
Events like these are especially notable because they were caught by cameras. Such events occur more frequently around the world than generally realized. It's also worth noting the Earth has a large amount of unpopulated land areas and oceans, however, it's entirely possible for a meteor to collide with or explode at a lower altitude over a populated area like a city. Small objects the size of your fist have been known to occasionally crash into populated areas.
I don't lose sleep over it but there are also possible ramifications that an asteroid hit "outta nowhere", could be misinterpreted as a nuclear attack within the initial hours after impact......possibly starting a nuclear exchange out of ignorance before radiation samples are taken.
Jeez i ad no idea this happened reciently and so thanks for posting this PITTS . It's incredible that we can into the early universe with our powerful telescopes and yet we can only find some asteroids a day or two away
What's your suggestion? We already have the NEO Program, and there are a lot of people that want to shut down NASA altogether. They're idiots, but their vote counts just as much as yours or mine.
Will another major impact happen? Yep. The "when" is the wildcard, and the odds are very strongly in favor of "not in our lifetimes."
My suggestion is we use our resources to stop killing one another and instead use them in matters of importance to the survival of our species; as you already said NEO is in place, yet did not detect this impactor until it was too late to react.
The idea is that the gravity could influence the path towards the Earth. That would be negligable if you consider it.
If the asteroid was deflected towards the Earth by Earth gravity, a near miss would make the asteroid come at us faster, but because of the shallow angle, wouldn't deflect it very much. If the asteroid was moving very slowly relative to the Earth, there would be greater deflection, but most travel at a fairly fast pace in relation to the Earth.
Tunguska is not as good a predictor of effect as the Barringer Crater in Arizona Meteor Crater
That asteroid impact was from one 150' across, which is VERY roughly 7 times more mass.
The effects of mass entering the atmosphere can vary wildly. As you'll remember, the breakup of the space shuttle had little effect on the ground other than showering down parts.
Time actually IS on our side. In early planet formation impacts were common. The solar system has been swept clean of most of the offenders by now.
I agree with most of what you are saying but you yourself admit that the mass and effects are not reliably predictable...I prefer to err on the cautious side...and the crater in Arizona is one mile in diameter....the blast effects would extend for MANY miles past the crater diameter!
Yes there is less chance of impact than Billions of years ago; that's obviously true and not a disputed point, but somtimes nitpicking prevails!
Jeez i ad no idea this happened reciently and so thanks for posting this PITTS . It's incredible that we can into the early universe with our powerful telescopes and yet we can only find some asteroids a day or two away
Reminds me of the 70's movie meteor
Thanx, some other posters are just "reading into" the opening post and enjoy nitpicking for the sake of it, instead of realizing the lack of reaction time is crucial! The point of the thread WAS we just found the impactor 14 to 17 hours before flyby.
October 8, 2009
Off one of the islands of Indonesia. Energy released from the explosion was estimated to be about 40-50 kilotons of TNT (110 million pounds of TNT, or about three times the energy of the nuclear bomb dropped on Hiroshima). iTWire - Meteor hits above Indonesia
November 20, 2008
Edmonton Canada. Estimated to have weighed (before fragmenting) 1 to 7 tons. The flash lit up the night sky. It's estimated to have been traveling at 134,216 miles per hour (37 miles per second). Fragments have been recovered. CTV Edmonton - Hunt begins for fragments of meteorite - CTV News
Events like these are especially notable because they were caught by cameras. Such events occur more frequently around the world than generally realized. It's also worth noting the Earth has a large amount of unpopulated land areas and oceans, however, it's entirely possible for a meteor to collide with or explode at a lower altitude over a populated area like a city. Small objects the size of your fist have been known to occasionally crash into populated areas.
Thanks for the additional information. I was on one of the Keys here late at night, when a small asteroid apparently exploded in the upper atmosphere...it got as bright as noon for a second and a few minutes later I heard the "shock wave" sonic boom...so I assume it vaporized over the Gulf of Mexico.
My suggestion is we use our resources to stop killing one another and instead use them in matters of importance to the survival of our species; as you already said NEO is in place, yet did not detect this impactor until it was too late to react.
Ok, say we "stop killing one another." Then what? Sing Kumbaya?
I don't think you realize just how difficult these things are to spot. And if they're coming from the direction of the sun, forget about it.
What would we do about it if we did spot it? It would be very difficult to hit a 70-ft object moving at several miles per second. Not very likely!
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but there are also possible ramifications that an asteroid hit "outta nowhere", could be misinterpreted as a nuclear attack within the initial hours after impact......possibly starting a nuclear exchange out of ignorance before radiation samples are taken.
. It's incredible that we can into the early universe with our powerful telescopes and yet we can only find some asteroids a day or two away 
