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If an asteroid big enough to destroy the world comes near us we probably won't be able to stop it so why worry. We would like have the ability to evacuate the planet before we would to stop a planet killer.
If an asteroid big enough to destroy the world comes near us we probably won't be able to stop it so why worry. We would like have the ability to evacuate the planet before we would to stop a planet killer.
An asteroid that large....5 or more miles across is still stoppable......I don't loose sleep over it. But I like to be prepared; with enough lead time it is still possible to deflect the impactor's trajectory...probably next to impossible, with current technology, to destroy it.
My worry is smaller impactors, which are far more prevalent in the Solar System; that will ONLY wipe out a major city in the blink of an eye, a scenario that may happen within a few hundreds of years...or tomorrow.
As far as evacuating a planet of over 6 BILLION people...GOOD LUCK...with any technology....the logistics would be next to impossible.....LOL. It would probably be much easier to move the entire Earth than evacuate it...you would need literally millions of starships.
Here's some new information.....25,000 NEW near Earth asteroids found in six months by the WISE Telescope...Here's the link>>>>>
25,000 new asteroids found by NASA's sky mapping | Science Headlines | Comcast.net (http://www.comcast.net/articles/news-science/20100716/US.SCI.Sky.Mapping.Telescope/ - broken link)
This stuff scares the heck out of me!!! An asteroid just passed beyond our Moon and the Earth's orbit (270,000 miles away) at approximately 7:06 PM yesterday; we just discovered it barely a day earlier. It was over 70 feet across, which is more than large enough to devastate any major city on impact or even if it shattered/exploded above said city.
We would barely have ample time to even contemplate any deflective or destructive scenario to prevent a collision with Earth. In January a smaller asteroid passed within 76,000 miles of Earth...that's ONLY about 10 Earth diameters away. One time soon, we are not going to be so LUCKY!!! And I myself, trying to stay current on Science Issues, just heard about it.
I think it's TIME the Worlds' Governments/Countries Take these threats MORE SERIOUSLY!!!! .
Small asteroid to zip harmlessly past Earth | Science Headlines | Comcast.net (http://www.comcast.net/articles/news-science/20100408/US.SCI.Asteroid.Flyby/ - broken link)
270k miles away? Well, the Earth is 8k miles in diameter. So this "close call" was the equivalent of firing a bullet and missing a foot-wide target by 34 feet. Literally, thousands of such "near misses" will occur for each hit. And those hits? Well, 70% of them will be over an ocean, not a major city. And the overwhelming majority of the remaining 30% over barren desert or ice fields or tundra or remote mountains of trackless forest. And even if it does hit over a populated area? It's still just 70' in diameter, most if not all of which will burn up when it hits the atmosphere. Hardly a city-killer.
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"Smaller" than seventy feet isn't an asteroid, it's a stone.
This story didn't deserve one exclamation point, much less four.
I'm an amateur astronomer... I know there are shock waves from various things - but not from IMPACTS, which is what YOU said, genius.
LOL......impacts impart debris fields which are in essence shockwaves and it would be nice to remain civil and present links to defend your opinions of which I added many on shockwaves!!!!!.
270k miles away? Well, the Earth is 8k miles in diameter. So this "close call" was the equivalent of firing a bullet and missing a foot-wide target by 34 feet. Literally, thousands of such "near misses" will occur for each hit. And those hits? Well, 70% of them will be over an ocean, not a major city. And the overwhelming majority of the remaining 30% over barren desert or ice fields or tundra or remote mountains of trackless forest. And even if it does hit over a populated area? It's still just 70' in diameter, most if not all of which will burn up when it hits the atmosphere. Hardly a city-killer.
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"Smaller" than seventy feet isn't an asteroid, it's a stone.
This story didn't deserve one exclamation point, much less four.
IF......you had read the links you would realize that a seventy foot diameter comet devasted over 2,000 square kilometers of Siberia decades ago( estimated yield of 5 to 30 MEGATONS)...obviously you did NOT read the links on this indisputable event. 3 eyerolls for you. I threw stones at smart A$$ kids as a child.....none were 70 feet in diameter..... ;-) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tunguska_event
That's not quite true. Where I would agree is that an impact or collision between a couple of asteroids or comets isn't going to generate shock waves that would make much difference to the Earth, except for a big chunk that could barrel down on the Earth.
But could a couple of asteroids colliding in space cause a shockwave? If it can't be done in space, then an exploding supernova wouldn't be able to show the results of a shockwave either. It gets into understanding more about shockwaves. A shockwave results from a massive release of energy. That energy is going to be transferred somewhere. In a scenario involving a couple of colliding asteroids, that collision is going to release energy.
It's easy to think that space is pretty empty and has no atmosphere, so how could a couple of asteroids cause a shockwave? It turns out that space isn't as empty as might be thought. There are atoms, dust, gasses, plasma, and all sorts of stuff in space. It's more concentrated in a solar system. When an explosion or a collision takes place, the energy released is carried by all that stuff which is what a shockwave is. It's the rapid transference of energy taking place at the scale of atoms.
I would agree that, apart from the potential of a hefty chunk hitting the Earth, the impact of a couple of colliding asteroids in space would have little, if any, effect on the Earth from any shockwave. The primary reason is related to scale. Shockwaves from asteroids are too small to make any difference to the Earth, not to mention that our atmosphere would cause most, if not all, to be absorbed or bounce off. With a supernova, which produce tremendous shockwaves (even colliding galaxies produce shockwaves) the evidence is more obvious and noticable because of the large scale of it. The bigger the objects, the bigger the shockwave. The impact of colliding asteroids in space can create a shockwave, albeit, rather miniscule in relation to the scale of the vast distances of the solar ststem.
The point is that shockwaves are not soley unique to a planet's atmosphere. They take place in space as well because space itself also contains a lot of material in it. It's just that the stuff in space isn't as densely compressed together.
Does that make sense?
I agree......Space is FAR from empty and I provided plenty of links to back up my claims for the other poster. Also there would be a debris field(essentially a shockwave made of matter) and pieces of an asteroid from a collision would certainly impact neighboring objects also changing their "orbits" just like playing pool, but vastly more complicated..
270k miles away? Well, the Earth is 8k miles in diameter. So this "close call" was the equivalent of firing a bullet and missing a foot-wide target by 34 feet. Literally, thousands of such "near misses" will occur for each hit. And those hits? Well, 70% of them will be over an ocean, not a major city. And the overwhelming majority of the remaining 30% over barren desert or ice fields or tundra or remote mountains of trackless forest. And even if it does hit over a populated area? It's still just 70' in diameter, most if not all of which will burn up when it hits the atmosphere. Hardly a city-killer.
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"Smaller" than seventy feet isn't an asteroid, it's a stone.
This story didn't deserve one exclamation point, much less four.
I am well aware of the mathematics.......the liklihood of an impactor striking the planet only increases as time goes by. FYI....the exclamation points(all four...LOL...pretty microdetail picking IMO) are there to grab other poster's attention that we did NOT know of this NEO until it had passed beyond our Moon's orbit. Use links to justify your opinions and IMO.....lay off counting exclamation points....that's saying something :-) As a child I threw stones at smarta$$ kids but I don't recall any being 70 feet in diameter. ;-))) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tunguska_event
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. But I like to be prepared; with enough lead time it is still possible to deflect the impactor's trajectory...probably next to impossible, with current technology, to destroy it. 
It would probably be much easier to move the entire Earth than evacuate it...you would need literally millions of starships. 
