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NASA Prepares to Launch Comet-Buster
Chessphoon writes "NASA's Deep Impact, a spacecraft named after the 1998 movie, is scheduled to launch on January 12. If all goes as planned, the spacecraft will collide with Comet Tempel 1 six months later on July 4, and create a crater so that the inside of the comet can be analyzed."
Yes, I read TFA. I know that there is no danger. But those crazy scientists in the movies always think they are safe too.
Photography, technology, and my dog Scout - http://mattstratton.com
What if the comets retaliate by impacting Earth?
"There are some people that if they don't know, you can't tell them." ~ Louis Armstrong
The NASA project was *not* named after the movie. Read http://www.cnn.com/2005/TECH/space/01/01/comet.bus ter.ap/index.html
for the real story.
One line blog. I hear that they're called Twitters now.
IMO, why waste money to see the content of a comet? There are so many better things to learn and explore in this great cosmos of ours.
I bet there's a tootsie pop in the middle and we'll still be left pondering that eternal question: how many licks does it take to get to the middle of a tootsie pop?
NASA should have considered planning this mission to be a near-flyby. Given their record of hitting what they aim to miss and missing what they aim to hit...
Everybody's a libertarian 'till their neighbour's becomes a crack house.
I think you are thinking about it the wrong way. NASA doesn't like to spend more money to send crafts over 1000 times the distance or greater (where other comets might be) but rather would spend money on analyzing a comet right near by. It saves them money actually and because they have never seen the comet up close its possible that its something besides just a big rock. NASA is full of optimists who think that something amazing to learn could be anywhere in the cosmos so they will take the time to look at anything they can. Waste of time, I don't think so.
Because if all comets are NOT ice, but just normal asteroids that generate massive plasma/electric charges, then that changes *ALL* theories on how the earth/solar system was evolved, and that throws out other derived theories, and then it makes more new ones, which would lead to more discoveries and finally allowing you to get your anti-gravity device to get to the moon. OK.
Liberty freedom are no1, not dicks in suits.
I have a better idea: why don't you divert money meant for the military to that worthy cause and stop whining about some millions spent on a space probe? Billions and billions are spent each day developing and building weapons. Incidentally, most misery on earth is caused by war (eg, famines are often caused by long wars causing farmers to stop cultivating the land).
You could also split it 50/50 between humanitary aid and space programs, you could still solve most if not all diseases and famine, while launching a mission like the two mars rovers EVERY DAY!
"It's too bad that stupidity isn't painful." - Anton LaVey
Send an I-pod instead. That might survive. If it doesn't get stolen en-route.
Meta will eat itself
She thinks that the NASA is just hiding the fact that the comet is about to hit us and is dangerous so they decided to blow it up but masked the attempt as a scientific experiment.
:)
(and before you, smartasses, ask me, yes, she is a girl
You can't handle the truth.
Deep Impact, by contrast, will provide "instant gratification," says Grammier. The entire $330 million mission should be wrapped up a month after impact.
So, the Europeans are going to geeeently land their little rover (Beagle III?), putter around, and delicately inspect rocks and dust. Boooriiiinng! :-)
NASA, in typical American fashion...
KA-BLOOIEE! Blow it up! Blow it up! I'm so glad I'm an American. This is a country that combines science, space explosions, and patriotism into one very cool bundle. And we can take pictures of it from Mars.I. Love. This. Countryyy! Yeeeeeeaaah! *does Bush/Ballmer monkey dance*