U.N. urged to take action on asteroid threat | Tech&Sci | Science | Reuters.com — At least we’re trying to keep up with these things.
An asteroid may come uncomfortably close to Earth in 2036 and the United Nations should assume responsibility for a space mission to deflect it, a group of astronauts, engineers and scientists said on Saturday. Astronomers are monitoring an asteroid named Apophis, which has a 1 in 45,000 chance of striking Earth on April 13, 2036.
Although the odds of an impact by this particular asteroid are low, a recent congressional mandate for NASA to upgrade its tracking of near-Earth asteroids is expected to uncover hundreds, if not thousands of threatening space rocks in the near future, former astronaut Rusty Schweickart said.
“It’s not just Apophis we’re looking at. Every country is at risk. We need a set of general principles to deal with this issue,” Schweickart, a member of the Apollo 9 crew that orbited the earth in March 1969, told an American Association for the Advancement of Science conference in San Francisco.
found by Aric Mackey
Congress should get busy to pass a resolution condemning any asteroid that strikes the earth.
I was really worried when I first read about this astroid but now that I know the UN is going to step up and take the lead, I feel a lot……
Oh crap!
Yes, the chips are down, the world is faced with certain doom… So let’s get a bunch of third world career bureaucrats to step in and fix things.
After all, when hundreds of billions of dollars are there to be had and neither competence nor honesty is required, who could be better than the UN?
It is a 460 foot asteroid – not the kind that causes mass extinction. If there is a 1:45k chance of hitting the earth, then there is about a 1 in 180.000 chance of it hitting land. It would probably kill alot of people over an area of 2500^2. Assume they all die, then using the population density of the earth, it would kill about 110.000 people. So the chance of death from this thing for an individual is essentially zero. (110.000/6,4b)*(1/180.000). Why spend millions of dollars to mess with this thing? – more people would be saved by spending the money to get piped water to more people.
Plus, now that Iraq is a democracy, there’s an empty slot in the Axis of Evil, so maybe Bush will promote the asteroid to full partnership with North Korea and Iran in his next State of the Union speech.
Most asteroids only dream of being in the Axis of Evil.
Plus, look at the possibilities for Halliburton to get involved. I just don’t see any down side.
I commented on this Long ago…
Near easth astroids???
you REALLy dont want to know…
Hope you enjoy the list…
http://cfa-www.harvard.edu/iau/lists/Dangerous.html
Doing nothing will embolden the asteroid.
Assume the asteroid falls – if it falls – in the US or some Far East economically developed country like South Corea or Japan. However ‘small’ the devastation, the economic and social – GLOBAL -impacts of such an event cannot be underestimated.
Now about being the UN solving the matter, I have huge doubts. If any action is required, it’ll be the US, Russia and maybe Europe stepping in and coordinating some sort of plan.
Don’t forget that there’s also asteroids with highly eliptical orbits, that never get seen except when’s too close, too late to do anything. Maybe Earth should have some sort of ‘rapid response’ means – even if it just stays there in orbit for millenia, doing nothing!
sounds like a good excuse to start pouring some $$$ into NASA again!
Who’s reoccuring nightmare is this?!?
Noone cares.
#10 – and why not? NASA’s budget has been systematically cut for decades. I’m not saying they manage their money well, but get some system to fix that issue, then fund NASA properly to do their job.
#12 – don’t get me wrong, I’m all for NASA getting more money. To play the devils advocate though: when did their job include asteroid defense?
I mean, to quote it from their site, NASA’s mission is to pioneer the future in space exploration, scientific discovery, and aeronautics research.
#13 – there’s nothing ‘unpioneering’ about trying to deflect an asteroid 🙂 And who else is up for the task? Apart from the Russians, that is?
Let’s just hope it hits, and wipes out the human virus that has infected our planet!
Let’s say it does hit. That means a 70% chance of hitting an ocean. That would send up huge amounts of water, creating massive cloud cover. That would cause a huge cooling effect similar to nuclear winter. Sounds like Mother Nature is taking care of Global warming (TM) for us.