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Mars Asteroid Impact Effectively Ruled Out

Posted by timothy on from the now-we-can-go-back-to-fretting-about-earth dept.

An anonymous reader writes with a followup to previous news noting the possibility that an asteroid would collide with Mars: "Further observations have reduced the odds of asteroid 2007 WD5 impacting Mars to approximately 1 in 10,000. According to NASA this asteroid followed the same pattern of increasing in probability, then finally being ruled out as a threat."

88 comments

  1. But I already built my bomb shelter by daveywest · · Score: 0, Offtopic

    first?

    1. Re:But I already built my bomb shelter by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

      Yes, first. But nobody cares.

  2. Too bad. by FuturePastNow · · Score: 1

    I'm sure astronomers were really hoping that this would happen. It would have been the scientific event of the decade.

    --
    Give a man fire, and you warm him for the night. Set a man on fire, and you warm him for the rest of his life.
    1. Re:Too bad. by Walt+Dismal · · Score: 1

      In related news, by an odd coincidence, a huge asteroid landed on NASA headquarters and totally obliterated it. Martians everywhere cheered.

  3. NEO prediction needs more funding by QuantumG · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Well, actually what it needs is a comp-sci department of a major university to take it on as a research project and apply for many many government grants for super-computer time. Simulating a chaotic system is never easy, but failure to calculate the orbit of a large NEO could be catastrophic.

    --
    How we know is more important than what we know.
    1. Re:NEO prediction needs more funding by hsdpa · · Score: 1

      Imagine the Beowulf-cluster needed to do that...

      --
      :(){ :|:& }:;
    2. Re:NEO prediction needs more funding by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

      The limiting factor is observation, not computation.

  4. What a shame! by techno-vampire · · Score: 4, Funny

    I guess there's not going to be a Mars-Shattering KABOOM! And I was so looking forward to it.

    --
    Good, inexpensive web hosting
    1. Re:What a shame! by peektwice · · Score: 1

      Quite funny... but I still can't believe that nobody has come out with the "big-ass asteroid hitting Uranus" joke yet...

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      Other than this text, there is no discernible information contained in this sig.
    2. Re:What a shame! by RuBLed · · Score: 1

      We could make it happen though. It's easier than you think, as easy as finding water on Mars.

    3. Re:What a shame! by lazy+genes · · Score: 0

      Hmmm, just have to wait for the next beagle.

    4. Re:What a shame! by gEvil+(beta) · · Score: 3, Funny

      Quite funny... but I still can't believe that nobody has come out with the "big-ass asteroid hitting Uranus" joke yet...

      I'd be more concerned about the ejecta matter leaving Uranus.

      --
      This guy's the limit!
    5. Re:What a shame! by C0rinthian · · Score: 1

      Asteroids? In my solar system? It's more likely than you think!

  5. This sucks. by Grishnakh · · Score: 4, Insightful

    A big-ass asteroid hitting our nearest planetary neighbor and causing massive damage would have been a good wake-up call to humanity. The only thing that would have been better would have been a big-ass asteroid smacking the Moon, leaving a crater large enough to see with the naked eye from Earth.

    1. Re:This sucks. by QuantumG · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Nah, that'd be worse. At least one astrophysicist would say that this is what the he Moon is for and you'd have the media repeating it and eventually everyone would believe the earth is immune to NEO.s.

      --
      How we know is more important than what we know.
    2. Re:This sucks. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Sure, a big-ass asteroid hitting Venus would be a good wake-up call, but why are you bringing up this scenario?

    3. Re:This sucks. by peektwice · · Score: 0, Troll

      So given that we currently have no proven technology to avoid such an impact, and given that the sun will eventually consume the earth anyway, when we do get this so-called "wake-up-call" what do you suggest we do? You can't stop the sun...

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    4. Re:This sucks. by QuantumG · · Score: 0, Flamebait

      That's the most retarded argument I've ever heard.

      --
      How we know is more important than what we know.
    5. Re:This sucks. by Joe+The+Dragon · · Score: 1

      the people at stargate command will find a way to save us.

    6. Re:This sucks. by peektwice · · Score: 0, Flamebait

      The point was, you_can't_stop_it. So why is it a wake-up call? I was hoping to bring out some cognitive thought, but apparently all I'm going to get is "that was retarded". A wake-up call usually serves to bring people to the realization that something needs corrected. Do you mean to suggest that we need to correct the orbital patterns of an asteroid? Are you suggesting that there is some way to correct the fact that we are infinitesimal in the grand scheme of the universe?.
      Let me put it in terms you can understand...
      You're a dumb ass

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      Other than this text, there is no discernible information contained in this sig.
    7. Re:This sucks. by QuantumG · · Score: 1

      What makes you think you can't stop it? Because you're unaware of basic astrophysics? If you know sufficiently in advance you can easily change the orbit of the object so it is no longer a threat. It's a chaotic system.. small changes in the inputs result in large changes in the outputs. But obviously if we bury our heads in the sand we have no chance of avoiding the catastrophe.

      What's more alarming is that if you have a *very* good model of the solar system you can work out how much you need to nudge an asteroid so that it will hit the Earth in 10 or 20 years time - you could cause an extinction event.

      --
      How we know is more important than what we know.
    8. Re:This sucks. by Grishnakh · · Score: 1

      Sorry, I forgot Mars is slightly farther than Venus. But an asteroid hitting Venus would be a non-event, unless the asteroid was gigantic. Venus is covered with thick clouds, so the surface isn't visible to us. Plus, there's a theory that the surface liquifies every so often because of the extreme heat and runaway greenhouse effect. With Mars, a large asteroid impact would be easily visible from earth, or with our rovers and probes if on the other side.

    9. Re:This sucks. by flewp · · Score: 1

      Jupiter is almost nothing but gas (at least what's visible to us) and yet we were able to witness the impacts and effects. Not only that, but Jupiter is pretty far away. The whole thing wasn't exactly a non-event. Average Joe-Six-Pack may not have cared too much, but it still made the news on a regular basis around the time of the event. My guess is an asteroid impact on Venus would punch a hole through it's atmosphere and scar it, and while a crater on the surface may not be visible (in the visible spectrum), we'd probably learn quite a bit regardless.

      --
      WWJD.... for a Klondike bar?
    10. Re:This sucks. by Grishnakh · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Sorry, but you're the dumbass here.

      If a Tunguska-sized asteroid (or worse, a Yucatan-sized one) is en route for earth, and we have 20 years' notice, it wouldn't be that hard to launch some nukes up there to nudge it into a safe orbit in time. We went from Sputnik to landing on the moon in less time than that, and all we have to do is make launch systems capable of taking our already-existing nuclear warheads and planting them on or near an asteroid some distance from earth (but probably less distance than Mars, which we have no trouble sending probes to). The only thing that's actually preventing us from deflecting asteroids is the fact that we don't have any prior warning of them, simply because we don't bother to look for them very hard.

      You talk about correcting the orbital patterns of an asteroid as if it's an impossible feat, but as I've already shown, it's quite realistic. The problem is just knowing about the asteroid in time to do something. A nuclear weapon can move an asteroid only slightly. With 10 years' notice, that's all you need. But if the thing is going to hit the earth in 1 day, the amount of power needed to move that rock would be astronomical. So who's the dumbass?

      As for "infinitesimal", as if an asteroid strike is unlikely, there are craters all over our planet from large asteroid strikes. I live a short distance away from one, in fact, located at "Meteor Crater, Arizona" (it's on Google Maps; it's where the final scene of Starman was shot incidentally). There's a much, much bigger one on the Yucatan peninsula in Mexico which was an extinction event. And in recent history, a comet came down in Tunguska, Siberia in the early 1900s, wiping out a huge amount of forest. If that had been a populated area, instead of a remote frozen tundra that even now is mostly unexplored, the devastation would have been greater than any natural disaster in history most likely. Another asteroid (or comet, not much difference really) striking the earth in the next few hundred years isn't as unlikely as you suggest, and certainly a much bigger worry than the Sun reaching the end of its lifespan, which we're fairly certain will take several billion years, which is more than enough time to deal with that problem.

    11. Re:This sucks. by Grishnakh · · Score: 1

      That's a good point. It's just that I think a big, visible crater in photographs would make more of an impact on Joe Six-pack's mind than a rock punching a hole through Venus's atmosphere. Mars is simply a lot more like earth than Venus in many ways: it's rocky, it has an atmosphere something like ours (it exists, but it's mostly transparent unlike Venus's), and we already have probes there driving around and sending back images. If a big asteroid struck it, our probes would be able to see the effects first-hand. (And we can't have probes on Venus because they can't take the heat.) I think it would be much more likely to cause the general public to think "hey, that could happen here!" if an asteroid hit Mars. The moon would be even better of course, because we could probably see it just by looking up, and that would be extremely close to home.

    12. Re:This sucks. by gEvil+(beta) · · Score: 1

      ...and certainly a much bigger worry than the Sun reaching the end of its lifespan, which we're fairly certain will take several billion years, which is more than enough time to deal with that problem.

      I'm sorry, but every time I see someone worrying about this I have to laugh. Both the Earth and the Sun are estimated to be about 4.6 billion years old. The end of the Sun's lifespan is estimated to be about 5 to 6 billion years off. It's not even halfway through it's life. By contrast, mankind has been around all of 2 million years. Why do so many people have this absurdly ridiculous notion that mankind will still be running around in another 5 or 6 billion (with a B) years? Humanity will be LONG dead and 100% forgotten by that point.

      --
      This guy's the limit!
    13. Re:This sucks. by teslar · · Score: 1

      A wake-up call to what, exactly? We're all gonna die burning asteroid death (maybe)?

      See, I really don't get this argument. I can understand a wake-up call about how we're messing with nature so much it's gonna end in tears. I can understand wake-up calls about poverty, misery, illness, all these things in our world. These are things we can at least try to do something about and the more people actually do, the better they may get. Or not, that's a different debate, but the point is that the world is choke-full of things we all need a wake-up call for so we can start thinking if, perhaps, we can do something to help.

      A wake-up call to a 1 in a 1000000000000000000000000000000 chance of a piece of rock hitting us? I couldn't care less, and even if I did care, there is nothing I can do about it.

      I guess you could take it to a different level, be more philosophical about it... remind us of our own mortality as an individual or remind us that the entire species could become extinct. Even under that light, I simply don't see the point of your statement. I am fully aware that I'm gonna die someday and the probability that it'll be tomorrow in a car crash is higher than that it'll be by a rock from space, ever. I'm not particularly fussed about it. As far as the entire species is concerned, we get reminded of that every day when another animal becomes extinct and thanks to the global warming fuss, there's always someone insisting that it'll be us next. There's no need for a wake-up call from an asteroid in either case. I am thus really at a loss as to what exactly in your statement is +5 Insightful (which is not your doing, so don't take it as a personal attack).

      As an aside, last time I checked, the moon was covered in craters of all sizes, I'm pretty sure I can see some of them just by looking out of the window. And I'm sure they're not just painted on.

    14. Re:This sucks. by Farmer+Tim · · Score: 1

      ...eventually everyone would believe the earth is immune to NEO.s.

      It may be too late already.

      --
      Blank until /. makes another boneheaded UI decision.
    15. Re:This sucks. by QuantumG · · Score: 2

      People who actually have any experience with these things know that there is something we could do, if we detect a collision early enough. The problem is that we don't yet have a program to do that.. because getting money for these things is all politics.

      So yes, just like the environment or poverty or (formally) disease, whether or not an extinction event is allowed to occur is entirely up to the politicians. A wake-up call is needed for them to justify the expense.

      --
      How we know is more important than what we know.
    16. Re:This sucks. by chebucto · · Score: 1
      Humanity will be LONG dead and 100% forgotten by that point.

      Probably. But I like the sci-fi idea that we'll get off this planet, spread our seed 'round the galaxy, and evolve. So that by the time the Sun consumes the Earth, our two-headed five-eyed descendants can drop by the solar system and watch the fireworks for fun.

      Back on topic: people _did_ get a 'wake up call' about the (v. small) threat asteroids pose about 10 years ago when there were two summer blockbusters on that theme. There was a lot of discussion in the media about how little asteroid-tracking work we were doing and how much we should do. Then, by the time summer was over, people had forgotten again. I think the only effective wake-up call would be another event like the one that happened in Siberia, perhaps happening in populated place.

      --
      The English word fart is one of the oldest words in the English vocabulary.
    17. Re:This sucks. by Kral_Blbec · · Score: 0

      Funny how the people I meet who say that they know they are going to die someday and that it dosnt bother them are the same people who dont seem to be very happy. IMO if you really really didnt care that someday your going to die then you would do something to advance the process as life is generally harder then it is happy. If there isnt anything past death and its just a blank void of non existance then I for one would opt for the void rather than face the multitude of daily problems. Whats the point of anything good if it all comes to naught? On the other hand, the people who really are happy are the ones who believe in some form of afterlife and have something to look forward to. They might not care that they are going to die someday, but its for entirely different reasons. Back to the topic onhand. I dont know what side to take on the whole philosophical "world will wake up and unite because of some disaster" theory. Some people might, but theres alot of people who wouldnt care that society is going down the drain, infact they might be speeding the process, because they are benifiting in the here and now and they expect to be gone by the time more problems arise.

    18. Re:This sucks. by Shimmer · · Score: 1

      Hey, wake up!

      The chances of a large asteroid impact in your lifetime are MUCH HIGHER than you think. The Earth is currently a "single point of failure" for humanity. We have the ability (and the obligation) to detect and escape such impacts.

      --
      The most rabid believers in American Exceptionalism are the exact same people whose policies are destroying it.
    19. Re:This sucks. by Fweeky · · Score: 1

      I couldn't care less, and even if I did care, there is nothing I can do about it. Detected early enough, you can push a future impactor away from its course with a couple of buckets of paint. You just need to invest some insignificant sum into projects like Spaceguard so you can do something about it.
    20. Re:This sucks. by crankyspice · · Score: 2, Funny

      A wake-up call to a 1 in a 1000000000000000000000000000000 chance of a piece of rock hitting us? I couldn't care less, and even if I did care, there is nothing I can do about it.

      Two words: Bruce Willis.

      --
      geek. lawyer.
    21. Re:This sucks. by Lisandro · · Score: 1

      Rendezvous with Rama has a particulary stunning description of an asteroid hitting earth on its first pages (which can be seen here in Amazon). The book as a whole is fantastic, but i always found that snippet very powerful and visual. In the book, it triggers the creation of an near-earth object monitoring system which sets the events for the rest of the story.

      I agree, maybe we need such a wake-up call.

    22. Re:This sucks. by peektwice · · Score: 1

      Thank you. I was hoping to lead others to that point, but your directness has beaten them to it. Obviously sitting around and worrying that we'll be hit by an asteroid, and spending trillions to try and prevent it is pointless. It's moot if we destroy ourselves or our only known inhabitable planet. Relax, unclench our collective assholes and let's all get a beer. If we're just being academic about the research of whether or not we could nudge an asteroid, that's fine. I personally will not be concerned. You fix it. I'll enjoy my beer. Don't send me a bill.

      --
      Other than this text, there is no discernible information contained in this sig.
    23. Re:This sucks. by Metasquares · · Score: 1

      Isn't the dominant theory that that's what the moon is? A chunk of the Earth that ended up in orbit when something big hit it?

    24. Re:This sucks. by ZombieRoboNinja · · Score: 1

      Again, 1 in a kajillion chance.

      Moving an asteroid off course would seem likely to require huge nuclear warheads in any case. Obviously, we can't wait until we see something headed towards us in a telescope to start refining uranium or whatever the hell, so we'd have to produce those huge warheads in advance.

        So if the options are (a) have some gigaton warheads sitting around in a bunker Just In Case or (b) hope we don't get hit, I'm thinking (b) is by far the SAFER option, because there's probably a greater than 1 in a kajillion chance that some asshole here on Earth would get a hold of those warheads and use them to create their very own man-made Extinction Event(TM).

    25. Re:This sucks. by hsdpa · · Score: 1

      I would guess that happend before my lifetime, you insensitive clod.

      --
      :(){ :|:& }:;
    26. Re:This sucks. by cdrguru · · Score: 2, Informative

      I'm going to try really hard not to use a lot of adjectives to describe your thinking on this.

      Are you nuts? Nuclear warheads? That is probably the absolute very last thing you would want to try to deflect a large body with. It might fracture, which would make problems much much worse.

      You see, the problem with lots of little rocks entering the atmosphere is a little detail called "atmospheric heating". Rocks get warm, transfer their heat to the air. A few rocks, no problem. Lots and lots of little rocks, big problem. Which is why the ending of the movie Deep Impact would have resulted in the end of all life on the planet, not a nice speech by the President.

      All it takes is a little push, or as previously alluded to, some paint to absorb solar radiation differently. No nuclear warheads. Maybe an Orion-type or NERVA propulsion system to get out that far.

    27. Re:This sucks. by canadian_right · · Score: 3, Informative

      Moving an asteroid is MUCH easier than solving poverty, crime or homelessness. If you have enough lead time it takes a relatively small rocket attached to the asteroid to steer it clear of the earth. A paper on moving asteroid, with 10N of force! Another simple proposal.

      On the other hand, there is already enough food for everyone on the whole planet, but human greed, for both wealth and power, prevents a huge number of people from enjoying peace and prosperity. And no amount of technical or political knowledge is going to help.

      In short, it is a very low chance event with very bad results that we CAN do something about.

      --
      Anarchists never rule
    28. Re:This sucks. by adamkennedy · · Score: 1

      Forget the crater, it's all about the impact flash.

    29. Re:This sucks. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Yeah, Slashdot nerds saw the movies and never got over them. Given the several hundred millions of years between asteroid strikes, and that the space program is improving over time anyway, why the fuck do you feel there's a pressing need to go about this? Or to waste time posting on Slashdot about it? Don't you have better things to worry about than the possibility of a once-every-several-hundred-million-years event?

    30. Re:This sucks. by QuantumG · · Score: 1

      no, see, this retard still thinks that "sufficient lead time" means "2 or 3 days". That's why he's talking about nuclear weapons. He's a product of Hollywood.

      --
      How we know is more important than what we know.
    31. Re:This sucks. by Sparklepony · · Score: 1

      Actually, an asteroid impact on the Moon that was large enough to leave a naked-eye-visible crater would be disastrous. Something like that would produce a tremendous amount of ejecta (shrapnel) and a lot of it would be blasted out with enough velocity to reach Earth. It'd be in small pieces so I doubt much would reach the ground, but say goodbye to our satellite fleet.

      Besides, this is all kind of backwards. Asteroid impacts are very rare, so the lack of an impact in this case is a wake-up call to those who might be unnecessarily freaking out about such a possibility.

    32. Re:This sucks. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Why don't you first learn how to properly construct a sentence or a paragraph, and then dwell on asteroids destroying the earth or whatever the fuck you pick up from sci-fi movies. You write like a 13 year old.

    33. Re:This sucks. by syousef · · Score: 1

      A wake-up call to a 1 in a 1000000000000000000000000000000 chance of a piece of rock hitting us?

      Ignoring the threat is asinine. Your statement of the odds shows a clear misunderstanding of the reality.

      The odds are exactly 100% that we'll get hit. It's just a matter of timing. Yes the chances you'll get hit in your lifetime are slim (though you've added too many zeros). If you don't give a damn about the human race surviving, you should skip the rest of this message.

      If you think I'm exaggerating, plenty of scientists predicted the odds of something like the Shoemaker-Levy comet as very very slim. It happened. Planetary impacts happen. Yes Earth's a smaller target with a lot less gravity, but our written history is terrible beyond a couple of hundred years and non-existent beyond a few thousand. Never mind the technology to see large impacts up close and personal.

      Here's why we should care. WHEN this happens it kills a significant proportion of the world's population or potentially even wipes us out. By contrast that Christmas Tsunami billed as the biggest tragedy to the human race in history killed a fraction of a percent of our population. EVEN if you think the chances are slim it'll happen the resulting carnage would be so immense that it's worth paying attention to.

      I bet you think it'd be reasonable to take out motor insurance even if you haven't had an accident for 10 years. Yet apparently paying attention to the world we live in beyond Earth has to be ridiculed and we need to pretend we're powerless to influence things beyond our own planet's orbit.

      --
      These posts express my own personal views, not those of my employer
    34. Re:This sucks. by Invidious · · Score: 1

      "A wake-up call to a 1 in a 1000000000000000000000000000000 chance of a piece of rock hitting us? I couldn't care less, and even if I did care, there is nothing I can do about it."

      Actually, the probability that the Earth will be hit by an asteroid which would be large enough to devastate continents, change the environment, and generally completely wreck the ecosphere is close enough to 1 that it doesn't matter. It'll happen, eventually, unless proactive detection-and-deflection measures are taken -- and we've actually developed some interesting ways to do that, as of late.

      So, what we have here is a threat to the entire human race -- actually, the entire biota of Earth. It is essentially a guarantee that Humanity's time on this rock is limited. If something else doesn't do us in first, an asteroid eventually will, unless we make that not happen.

    35. Re:This sucks. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Oh, quit trying to save face. I feel embarrassed for you enough already. Just admit (to yourself) that you said something a little dumb. Even Einstein said dumb things on more than a few occasions.

    36. Re:This sucks. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Are you serious?

      First of all, for a Tunguska-sized asteroid, the easiest solution would be to track it until precise enough predictions can be made of the impact location and evacuate.

      For something bigger...why does everyone assume that "just using nukes" would work? Especially on a really big one (one big enough that it would have global effects)? Only a small fraction of the force will be directed towards the asteroid.

    37. Re:This sucks. by dintech · · Score: 1

      "Meteor Crater, Arizona" (it's on Google Maps; it's where the final scene of Starman was shot incidentally).

      And also the final scene of Mac and Me.

      I should really have posted this AC...

    38. Re:This sucks. by gEvil+(beta) · · Score: 1

      Maybe you should learn to read. My comment had absolutely nothing to do with fending off a meteor impact. My comment was entirely directed to people worrying about what happens to mankind when the Sun goes supernova. Simply put, there will be no mankind left when the Sun goes supernova. If you want to argue otherwise it shows that you have a complete and total lack of comprehension of the timescales involved in the Earth and Sun's history, and the history of life on this planet.

      --
      This guy's the limit!
    39. Re:This sucks. by Ihlosi · · Score: 1
      My comment was entirely directed to people worrying about what happens to mankind when the Sun goes supernova.



      The Sun will not go supernova. It's simply not massive enough.

    40. Re:This sucks. by gEvil+(beta) · · Score: 1

      True. It will probably only ever become a giant star. Either way, the point still stands that there will be zero remnant of mankind left when the Sun gets to that point. So worrying about what "happens to mankind" when that happens is utterly moot.

      --
      This guy's the limit!
    41. Re:This sucks. by teslar · · Score: 1

      Your statement of the odds shows a clear misunderstanding of the reality.
      Never attribute to misunderstanding to reality what can adequately be explained by repeated bashing of keys for effect. However - no offense intended, but your statement of exactly 100% is also misunderstanding reality. On top of my head, I can think of three scenarios where earth will never get hit by an asteroid without us actively preventing such an event:
      • Earth is destroyed through other means beforehand
      • The Universe runs out of rocks to fling at us
      • All asteroids are on trajectories that ensures they never collide with earth
      And while these (especially No 3) seem pretty remote possibilites, the chance of the second point happening actually tends to 1 as time goes to infinity. I don't think the Universe is a perpetual motion device, so eventually there simply won't be anything flying around anymore. So no, the chance that we get hit by a rock from space from now on till the end of time is pretty high but not exactly 100%.

      Here's why we should care. WHEN this happens it kills a significant proportion of the world's population or potentially even wipes us out.
      I think I didn't make myself clear enough (should know better than post at 3am in the morning). Of all the things we should care about and that need fixing lest we be headed towards disaster, a rock from space is not very high on the priority list, that's all - and Joe Average does not need a wake-up call about it just yet. If one does come our way, yeah, we're screwed, that's true enough and of course it is preferential to avoid such an event. More so if it only wipes out a part of the population rather than the entire species. But, it's not like there's a thousand rocks heading towards us with impact absolutely imminent and everyone's just sitting around twiddling their thumbs. Rather, there is a small but non-zero probability that we'll be hit in 50 years or so and there are scientists working on this, thinking about what to do in such a case. So we are caring in a way that is commeasurate with the threat. Hence I don't see the need for a wake-up call.
    42. Re:This sucks. by Ihlosi · · Score: 1
      And while these (especially No 3) seem pretty remote possibilites,



      Actually, we can be pretty sure that No 1 will happen at some point (when solar luminosity has increased enough to boil the oceans off the surface of Earth), but that's still over a billion years off. No 2 is pretty unlikely. The solar system is just too full of all kinds of rocks. No 3 is hard to predict due to the sheer number of objects in the solar system that all interact gravitationally.

    43. Re:This sucks. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      It's a chaotic system.. small changes in the inputs result in large changes in the outputs.

      But that's where the rub is. While small changes make huge differences, it will be hard to predict if an object will hit the Earth. By the time the odds get high enough, it may be too late to make subtle adjustments.

    44. Re:This sucks. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      There IS something that we, as a species can do about extinction level events: Colonize the solar system (and beyond).

      As long as our entire species is confined and reliant on Earth, we will be vulnerable to these types of impacts. The further we spread our species, the larger (and more rare) of an event that will be required to eliminate us.

      So what can *you* do to help colonize space? Encourage your lawmakers to appropriate the funds to human space exploration.

    45. Re:This sucks. by hcdejong · · Score: 2, Funny

      A paper on moving asteroid, with 10N of force!

      Paper beats rock, then? We already knew that.

    46. Re:This sucks. by Grishnakh · · Score: 1

      All it takes is a little push, or as previously alluded to, some paint to absorb solar radiation differently. No nuclear warheads. Maybe an Orion-type or NERVA propulsion system to get out that far.

      We don't need gigaton nukes to deflect asteroids. A simple megaton one like the ones we already have stockpiled in huge quantities will do just fine. And as for fracturing, that's simple: you detonate the nuke a distance away from the asteroid, so that you push it instead of fracture it.

      Of course, if you detect it early enough, you could use a small chemical rocket, but the earlier you detect it, the greater the error in predicting its exact course relative to the earth.

      No one (except maybe a few idiots) is talking about sending Bruce Willis and putting a nuke inside an asteroid to break it apart.

    47. Re:This sucks. by Grishnakh · · Score: 1

      I agree, maybe we need such a wake-up call.

      After reading many of these other comments on this supposedly "news for nerds" site, I'm thinking that it'd be better if we were just hit with a planet-killer asteroid and wiped out.

    48. Re:This sucks. by Grishnakh · · Score: 1

      Actually, an asteroid impact on the Moon that was large enough to leave a naked-eye-visible crater would be disastrous. Something like that would produce a tremendous amount of ejecta (shrapnel) and a lot of it would be blasted out with enough velocity to reach Earth. It'd be in small pieces so I doubt much would reach the ground, but say goodbye to our satellite fleet.

      That's ok. Satellites can be (relatively) easily replaced, and that'd be even more of a wake-up call.

      Besides, this is all kind of backwards. Asteroid impacts are very rare, so the lack of an impact in this case is a wake-up call to those who might be unnecessarily freaking out about such a possibility.

      As I already pointed out, we just had a city-killer comet hit the earth only about 100 years ago. Too bad it hit some remote tundra instead of a populated city.

    49. Re:This sucks. by Grishnakh · · Score: 1

      First of all, for a Tunguska-sized asteroid, the easiest solution would be to track it until precise enough predictions can be made of the impact location and evacuate.

      Evacuating a large city is a monumental task, and takes a lot of time to be done in an orderly way without panic, chaos, and loss of life.

      It's a LOT easier, IFF you have the appropriate advance notice, to just send a nuke up and change the asteroid's orbit. Less resources, and FAR less destruction. Can you imagine the after-effects caused by, say, the destruction of NYC? The economic effects would be devastating, millions would be displaced, etc.

      For something bigger...why does everyone assume that "just using nukes" would work? Especially on a really big one (one big enough that it would have global effects)? Only a small fraction of the force will be directed towards the asteroid.

      Another stupid comment in a long line of stupid comments on this thread.

      As already pointed out, if you have enough advance warning, it doesn't take that much force to change an asteroid's orbit to a safe one. Using nukes make sense because 1) they're fairly powerful compared to anything else we have, like chemical rockets, 2) they don't require much mass compared to, say, the fuel required for a chemical rocket of equal effectiveness, so we wouldn't need to build another Saturn V, and could probably get one in place with a small Atlas rocket, or whatever we use to send up the Mars probes, and 3) we already have tons of them we're not doing anything productive with.

    50. Re:This sucks. by Sparklepony · · Score: 1

      "Too bad it hit some remote tundra instead of a populated city"? Exactly what are your intentions here? It's a good thing it missed a populated city! Not that a hit on a populated city was particularly likely - there's an awful lot more remote tundra, empty ocean, unpopulated desert, etc. than there is cityscape on Earth.

    51. Re:This sucks. by Grishnakh · · Score: 1

      "Too bad it hit some remote tundra instead of a populated city"? Exactly what are your intentions here? It's a good thing it missed a populated city!

      Perhaps. I'm just thinking, darkly, after reading all these idiotic replies here on this thread, that that's about the only way to get humanity to wake up. I should probably just be realistic and realize that humanity is doomed. We probably only have 50-100 years left before we destroy ourselves because of greed and stupidity.

    52. Re:This sucks. by syousef · · Score: 1

      . On top of my head, I can think of three scenarios where earth will never get hit by an asteroid without us actively preventing such an event:

      Your 3 scenarios are so statistically unlikely, you may as well go out and buy a lotto ticket.

      I speak as someone who has a masters degree in astronomy (but I did the degree for myself, I've never used it professionally). You're speaking as someone who chooses to hold your hands over your ears and yell lalalalala at the top of your voice while sticking your head in a bucket of sand.

      I don't think the Universe is a perpetual motion device, so eventually there simply won't be anything flying around anymore. So no, the chance that we get hit by a rock from space from now on till the end of time is pretty high but not exactly 100%

      So let me get this straight. With the future of humanity at stake, you instead tend to quibble about whether a probability is virtually 100% or exactly 100%. I can see you have your priorities in order. Betting the future of humanity on chances much less remote than winning lotto isn't sane.

      Of all the things we should care about and that need fixing lest we be headed towards disaster, a rock from space is not very high on the priority list, that's all - and Joe Average does not need a wake-up call about it just yet.

      When should they get that wakeup call? Right as the earth's about to be obliterated? With current technology we have something like a 1 in 10 chance (probably much less but that's best case) of even seeing the fucking thing coming. Precisely because fools like you and the uneducated Joe Average would rather spend resources on hollywood movies and assinine wars than actually trying to protect life on Earth. Where do you think funding comes from? How much funding do you think scientists get if it's not on Joe Average's radar.

      Hence I don't see the need for a wake-up call.

      I don't see the need in refuting this further. You've demonstrated a complete lack of understanding of the situation, an ability to quibble about the trivial (meaning and nature of statistics) while ignoring the important, and shown a total disregard for enormous loss of human life. You're either troll or an idiot and I have no more time for either.

      --
      These posts express my own personal views, not those of my employer
    53. Re:This sucks. by AbRASiON · · Score: 1

      I don't know much about science or astronomy but I would have thought if something is heading on a course for the moon, wouldn't it be more likely the earths stronger gravitational field would have grabbed it?

    54. Re:This sucks. by Grishnakh · · Score: 1

      I guess it depends on exactly what its course is, in relation to the earth's and the moon's at that time. With all those variables, and the large distances involved, that's probably why astronomers have a bit of difficulty predicting with 100% accuracy whether a not an asteroid is going to hit a body, or just have a very close miss.

  6. Murphy's law... by kcbanner · · Score: 0

    ...think about it.

    --
    Obligatory blog plug: http://www.caseybanner.ca/
  7. earth by emj · · Score: 1

    you mean it will crash into earth?

    1. Re:earth by Cassius+Corodes · · Score: 2, Funny

      It means the asteroid will have a breakdown due to comically improper set-up before it reaches mars.

      --
      Control is an illusion, order our comforting lie. From chaos, through chaos, into chaos we fly
    2. Re:earth by jamstar7 · · Score: 2, Funny

      It's running Vista?????????????

      --
      Understanding the scope of the problem is the first step on the path to true panic.
  8. What if they caused it to happen? by CrazyJim1 · · Score: 2, Interesting

    What if they did the opposite of what everyone thinks they'll do if a sizeable object is going to hit Earth? What if they detonate a nuke and reroute the asteroid to hit Mars? I think they wouldn't do it because the newspapers would say,"The government is aiming asteroids at planets, are they going to use them as weapons in the future?"

    --
    God spoke to me.
    1. Re:What if they caused it to happen? by Megane · · Score: 3, Informative

      At this point, even with favorable orbits, and a payload already loaded and ready for launch, you still couldn't get there in time. The fast orbit to Mars still takes six months. The slow orbit takes two years. I don't think they even knew about this event six months ago.

      --
      #naabhaprzrag, #sverubfr-000, #agi-fcbafberq, negvpyr[pynff*=' negvpyr-ary-'] { qvfcynl: abar !vzcbegnag; }
    2. Re:What if they caused it to happen? by cooley · · Score: 1

      What if they did the opposite of what everyone thinks they'll do if a sizeable object is going to hit Earth? What if they detonate a nuke and reroute the asteroid to hit Mars? I think they wouldn't do it because the newspapers would say,"The government is aiming asteroids at planets, are they going to use them as weapons in the future?" Even if we *could* pull that off, why *would* we? Just move the thing out of the way. If there's a tree branch blocking my driving lane, I move it into the ditch (not into oncoming traffic).
      --
      Just then the floating disembodied head of Colonel Sanders started yelling Everything You Know Is Wrong!-Weird Al
    3. Re:What if they caused it to happen? by Hardhead_7 · · Score: 1

      Why wouldn't you just shoot the nuke at Mars, then?

    4. Re:What if they caused it to happen? by misleb · · Score: 1

      What if they send up a team of offshore oil drillers to land on the asteroid and drive around on it and plant the nuke? That would be awesome! You could even make a movie about it... oh wait. They already made that movie. And it sucked. Oh well.

      --
      "THERE IS NO JUSTICE, THERE IS ONLY ME." -Death
    5. Re:What if they caused it to happen? by notthepainter · · Score: 1

      It was discovered on November 20, 2007.

  9. There's still ONE chance by WormholeFiend · · Score: 1

    right?

    1. Re:There's still ONE chance by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Yes, unlike you getting laid.

  10. Crap summary by EmbeddedJanitor · · Score: 1
    "would" is wrong "might", maybe. Would suggests a very high probability. The previous postings hinted at 1 in 75 and that has now been downgraded to 1 in 30k.

    How can we mock USA Today when so-called geeks are so poor at handling numbers.

    --
    Engineering is the art of compromise.
  11. So, does that mean ... by Ihlosi · · Score: 1

    ... that the asteroid uses the metric system ?

  12. Where is it going? by Notquitecajun · · Score: 1

    Now the question is where is it going? Relatively speaking, it's rather cramped in space around there, so we may have to see what Mars' does to its trajectory before we know where else it could go. Hopefully it'll hit something not-earth (or moon).

  13. Martians can breathe a sigh of relief by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I've been following their news programs on subspace. Was pretty dicey there for a bit.

  14. Hurricanes by PetiePooo · · Score: 1

    Anyone living in a southern coastal state should be familiar with this pattern.

    When a hurricane is first spotted heading our way, its usually too far out to have any idea where its going to end up. As it keeps heading our way, the likelihood of a strike gets higher and higher. When we're in the 5-day cone, we start making rushes for the store. When we're in the 3-day cone, we put up shutters. Then, a day before, the cone narrows to the point that we see its going far enough South or West that we're not going to be hit.

    The odds keep going up and up until we have sufficient data to know exactly where its final course is and the odds plummet. Its a normal cycle.

    1. Re:Hurricanes by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Unless you are in the zone where the hurricane reaches land, then the odds keep going up until the hurricane makes landfall.

    2. Re:Hurricanes by Captain+Nitpick · · Score: 1

      The major difference being that hurricanes behave chaotically and can make a sudden 90 degree turn at the last moment. Even if you're outside the 24-hour cone, you should keep your shutters up until the thing hits.

      Asteroids don't generally change course unpredictably.

      --
      But then again, I could be wrong.