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Using Gravity To Tow Asteroids

Posted by ScuttleMonkey on from the and-you-thought-a-snails-pace-was-slow dept.

cryptocom writes "Space.com is reporting that two scientists at NASA are proposing using a 20-ton spacecraft to pull asteroids off a possible collision course with Earth, using the spacecraft's own gravity as an attractor. This idea would not only be cheaper, but have a much higher chance of success, due to not having to actually land on the asteroid's surface."

2 of 508 comments (clear)

  1. Re:The mother of all asteroid deflection devices by GungaDan · · Score: 0, Redundant

    Why not take the majority of the spacecraft's mass from an object already outside of Earth's atmosphere? Send this asteroid-tractor into space with a big empty cargo (er, ballast?) hold, and pick up a bunch of moon (or maybe chunks of some other asteroid) once it's well beyond Earth's gravity?

    --
    Eloi are stupid, throw morlocks at them!
  2. Death by Stupidity by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Redundant

    Archiemeides already explained how to do this.
    "Give me a Tree branch or fulcrum long enough and I can move the world"

    It dosn't get any simpler than that. sheesh

    All we have to do is find the right size of tree branch.

    "Or change the rules of science before it hits and then were saved"

    Autism explained

    Gunillablue