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NASA's Deep Impact
NivenMK1 writes "The Seattle Times has an interesting article on NASA's plan to nail the comet Tempel 1 with a chunk of copper the size of a bathtub on July 4 this year. This copper 'bullet' is intended to strike the comet at approximately 23,000 mph and hit with a force equivalent to 4.7 tons of TNT.
Scientists hope to discover what exactly the comet is made of and what changes have occurred to the outer layers with reference to the core."
July 4 this year?! What a coincidence - it's the date the project I'm working on now should be finished to.
...where the bullet misses its target and curves back round to origin.
Don't miss guys - and watch out for Hubble!
AT&ROFLMAO
Would it not be cheaper/better to drop a lump of high explosive on it rather than a heavy lump of copper?
http://blog.nexusuk.org
....But hitting a rock on Independance day sounds like a bad idea, what if it's an Alien's rock?
We can't just keep going around the Solar system bashing things up that's not ours!
Why copper?
Is it because Tempel 1 is known to not contain any copper itself, so it makes the spectral signature easier to read?
Are there any possible issues like destruction of important "environments"(if a comet could be called an evironment) if the comet is blown to pieces by this experiment? I mean, is it possible that important microorganisms or other important/rare/valuable occurences may be destroyed if this comment is blown up? It kind of reminds me of some of the unintended consequences of mans earlier forays into new environments on earth. I just wonder if these kind of scenarios have been considered.
820 pounds, from the first sentence of paragraph 3.
The article doesn't state if this velocity is relative to Cape Cod or relative to the comet. It makes a big difference.
They'll develop a working missile defense system. All kidding aside how hard is it going to be to position this giant copper bullet in the path of a speeding comet? How acurately can they predict the comets path (whenever I here about near earth passes they are always given in wide ranges as to how near they actually came). So maybe I just naieve but the idea that we could hurl a giant block of metal into a comet traveling 23,000 miles per hour millions of miles away, I feel like a kid again at the wonderment.
Our comets are now under attack. Please join the Society for the Preservation of Comets, before it's too late.
Hopefully together we can make a difference. It's time to stop these bigoted scientists from damaging comets with bathtub size copper slugs, just "to see what will happen."
Without comets, there would be no space snowballs. This must stop.
Take the cheese to sickbay, the doctor should see it as soon as possible - B'Elanna Torres, "Learning Curve"
...NASA is lying. The comet is actually heading straight for Earth and the best plan they have is to launch a copper bathtub filled with Bruce Willis.
Unfortunately, the MPAA sent a cease and desist order to NASA informing them that this would be infringing on the IP of one of their client's copyrighted movies.
Hence, plan B involves throwing a bathtub at the comet instead. Go NASA!
Look at the numbers:
The impact power of the copper rod is 4+ tonnes of TNT. IF you wanted to double the blast, you would have to send more than 4 tonnes of explosives.
at 30km/s+, the kinetic energy of the material is bigger than the chemical energy of explosives.
The added energy just doesnt matter anymore because it would be difficult to time the blast, plus the softness of the explosives would reduce the impact penetration.
HI O WISE PRINCE. WHT TOOK U SO DAM LONG?
Is this a test of a planetary defence system? Imagine if the dinosaurs could have had one of those.
GETPKG - Package Management for Slackware
Am I the only one who feels this is the start to a disaster movie?
"The year is 2004, and the scientists of the day decide to crack open a comet with a bullet the size of a bathtub. But then the unthinkable happens. The comet bullet causes the comet to change path and come right towards Earth and there is nothing we can do to stop it. Will all Earth will be destroyed? Will our hero be able to save the world? There is only one way to find out..."
Coming to cinemas everywhere this Summer.
da w00t. mtfnpy?
Nasa is conducting the experiment precicely BECAUSE nobody know what will happen next. If we knew with certainty what was going to happen, THEN there wouldn't be a very good reason for carrying on with the experiment.
Last year they spent $200 billion blowing up comet Baghdad and we're all still waiting to see how that cliffhanger's going to end! This time it's cheaper and it doens't involve killing anybody.
I've loved astronomy on a casual basis since childhood and I think it's important to mankind. I'm not one of those people who thinks we should abandon NASA spending because there are still underprivilidged marmasets living in a swamp somewhere or whatever.
But isn't this kind of, uh... wrong? Possibily destroying a comet? It seems so destructive to possibly break apart something that's been circling our sun for millions of years.
I understand that comets are more like "dirty snowballs" than things of infinite beauty, and I can definitely understand the scientific reasons for this mission because they're going to get all kinds of data that they couldn't get otherwise.
This seems kind of wrong to me, though.
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What happens if the comet doesn't like being shot with the world's biggest bullet, and decides to come after us? Has NASA factored this into their plans?
This project has been around since 2001; probably a dup /. article somewhere... Anyway, here is the NASA website, which gives more details on the mission.
http://deepimpact.jpl.nasa.gov/
ph34r teh p0w3r 0f th3 c0w
Captains additional: Does this mean we can add 'bath tub' to the ISO weights and measures along with VW Beetle, football field and 18 wheel truck?
'Got a nice yacht, perchance?
Something else is going on. They can pick pieces of comet out of the moon if they wanted it. No point in blowing money on this unless it's for defense. Copper my ass.
Another reason they are doing a kinetic impact is because they want to judge the structure of the comet. Right now, scientists don't really know if the comet's consistency is that of a fluffy snowball or a hard chunk of ice. If you used explosives, you would have melting of the ice, whatever its consistency, and would get less information about the construction of the comet. Once possibility is that the comet might be loosely packed enough that the impactor goes in one side and flies out the other....
Also, I'm surprised the article submitter didn't include a link to the mission website.....
And I quote:
"If we knew what we were doing it wouldn't be research."
- Albert Einstein
we still manage to keep our poor people fed (our homeless don't starve, they just live outside!)
Perhaps you should read this article
http://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory?id=286105
"Unfortunately, the blessing of abundant food is not shared by all Americans," Iowa Gov. Tom Vilsack said. "A recent report from our Department of Agriculture documented an increase in hunger in America, particularly among our children."
How acurately can they predict the comets path (whenever I here about near earth passes they are always given in wide ranges as to how near they actually came).
You hear about near-Earth passes, as you call them, because they're always the first time we've noticed said object getting close to the Earth. This comet (and many others, plus asteroids, etc) has a pretty well-known orbit around the Sun. We have plenty of observations and can accurately predict where it's going to be at any given point in time (barring things like orbital changes due to outgassing, disintegration, etc).
There's another object in the sky that we can do this with: the Moon. It's VERY close to Earth, yet we can be pretty safe in saying it ain't about to hit us. Lots of observations == confidence in a body's motion.
The "scary" ones you hear about are new objects we've never seen before, and all of sudden they look like they're coming "close". Once we get enough observations of them, we can calculate their orbits, and you pretty much never hear about them again.
Endless arguments over trivial contradictions in books written by ignorant savages to explain thunder in the dark.
I once spoke to someone who works on the Deep Impact project, and he said that, after the Mars Polar Odyssey crashed, their motto became "Deep Impact: We're Supposed to Crash."
I have gas, but my car uses petrol.
So, the ton of TNT is now a unit of force?
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PGP Key ID 0xCB8FF658
I hope the aliens onboard the spaceship inside the comet don't mind.
Hitting comet vs. Missile defense:
You left out the most important factor:
5. Comet has no acceleration except from (reliable) gravity. Missile has onboard thrusters that can push the object in unpredictable ways, such as to specifically evade the attack.
It's true that there are occasional comets which give of thrust, but that happens when they're close enough to a star to heat up and blast steam.
3.Comet is in a microgravity enviroment, bullet could stop and wait for comet vs. warheads
That's a pointless idea. In the depths of the solar system the concept of "stopping" is barely meaningful. The only way an object could "stop" would be to enter a stable orbit, which is still basically moving. Otherwise you'd still need "constant thrust" to fight gravity. It's far better to use a single-curve trajectory than to try and alter it like that.
Besides, you get more destructive power from a faster hit.
Leave it to Americans to come up with a plan along the lines of: "Wonder what that's made of... lets blow it up!"
Spending 311 million dollars without knowing what happens next doesnt seem a very nice idea.
I am sure there is military research aspect in this project too. The ability to hit a comet with a bathtub-sized hunk of metal is probably good practice for hitting an adversary's satellite with a bar of soap-sized hunk of metal.
I highly doubt this is purely civilian science in action.
The only athletic sport I ever mastered was backgammon - Douglas William Jerrold
All they have to do is get the Genesis team to try to gently land the copper bullet onto the comet.
Nasa should get funding from the NRA (National Rifle Assoc.) and Smith and Wesson. This will be the largest bullet ever made!
..........FULL STOP.
A lot of observing and imaging of comets and their dust comas, and analysis of the resulting images, is being carried out by Jana Pittichova, a postdoctoral fellow (and triathlete!) on Karen's research team, primarily using the University's 88-inch telescope atop Mauna Kea.
Being one of the operators on that telescope, I've worked with Jana on several nights - probably one-third to one-half of the Meech team's total observing this semester.
Although I understand how the observations are carried out from a purely operational and practical standpoint, I haven't seen what the actual analysis looks like... and even if I did, the odds are good that I'd need a lot of explaining, since I'm not a Ph.D. myself!
Village idiot in some extremely smart villages.
The USA has sold the farm - innovation is what it has left and weird patent laws are trying to kill that too. Experiments such as this are an investment in the future, so if you are worried about the future of the USA you should be behind such things as this. And stop your management getting hold of hard drugs, that's the only thing that can explain a lot of decisions.
And this is an example of why "America" is no longer great.
:
.....
If you (as a country) spent less time watching "info-mercials" and more time actually learning real history, you would know that Henry Ford is responsible for the introduction of the production line. He didn't invent the car, there were French, German and British inventions way before his car was built.
As for inventing the aeroplane, that is not entirely true either. The wright brothers were credited with the first powered flight, but they built on the work of others in Europe, and there is even some doubt as to whether they were the first to achieve powered flight.
As to the Chrysler/Mercedes Benz thing, you do realise that most of the inventions that "America" is famous for were invented by European immigrants. Names such as Einstein and Werner von Braun spring to mind here.
Add all this to the fact that "American" companies have been taking over the rest of the worlds industries with the almighty dollar for over 40 years and you might realise what the fuss over globalisation is about.
fucking goldfish memory !
Telephone - Alexander Graham Bell - Born in Scotland
Wireless transmission - Guglielmo Marconi - Born in Italy
Manhattan Project - J. Robert Oppenheimer - Born In New York to German Immigrants
Electronic Computer - Konrad Zuse - Born in Germany
Helicopter - SIKORSKY, Igor Ivanovich - Born in Russia
Motorcycle - Gottlieb Daimler - Born in Germany
Bicycle - James Starley - Born in England
Jet airplane - Hans von Ohain - Born in Germany
British
Disc Brakes - Frederick William Lanchester
Tin Can - Peter Durand
Cat Eyes - Percy Shaw
Portland Cement - Joseph Aspdin
Cordite - Sir James Dewar, Sir Frederick Abel
Electric Motor - Michael Faraday
Locomotive - Richard Trevithick
Periscope - Sir Howard Grubb
Polyester - John Rex Whinfield and James Tennant Dickson
Viagra - Peter Dunn, Albert Wood, Dr Nicholas Terrett
Waterproof Fabric - Charles Macintosh
World Wide Web - Tim Berners-Lee