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Deep Impact Mission May Be Extended
SeaDour writes "The famous Deep Impact mission, which in 2005 launched a projectile in the path of comet Tempel 1, may be extended by NASA. The proposal is to slingshot the probe around the Earth as it passes by at the end of this year, putting it on a trajectory to reach comet Boethin in December 2008. Scientists want to see if the strange composition and behavior of Tempel 1 is more common than they had previously assumed. (The probe only had one projectile though, so we will not see another brilliant man-made explosion on this comet.) Additionally, while the probe is en route to the comet, researchers will point its on-board telescope at known exosolar planets to determine the compositions of their atmospheres."
According to this http://www.lpl.arizona.edu/impacteffects/ 2 mile long asteroid is going to shatter a lot of glass, but you've got to be 600 miles away or closer to suffer. In other words, most people will know about it from the news, or if they're sensitive they'll notice that some noise just passed by. A comet will be more noticeable, but not dramatically - they're made of ice, not iron + nickel.