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NASA Downgrades Asteroid-Earth Collision Risk

Posted by timothy on from the elephant-detector-working-fine dept.

coondoggie writes "NASA scientists have recalculated the path of a large asteroid known as Apophis and now say it has only a very slim chance of banging into Earth.. The Apophis asteroid is approximately the size of two-and-a-half football fields, and updated computational techniques and newly available data indicate the probability of an Earth encounter on April 13, 2036 for Apophis has dropped from one-in-45,000 to about four-in-a million, NASA stated."

1 of 244 comments (clear)

  1. Probability? by dave562 · · Score: 0, Redundant

    The article states that the probability of a collision went from 1 in 45,000 to about 4 in a million. I never made it very far in math, but it seems like 4 in a million is the same as 1 in 250,000. What's the point of saying 1 in 45,000 and then 4 in a million instead of in 1 in 250,000?