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NASA Snaps New Photo of Incoming Asteroid
astroengine writes "Wider than an aircraft carrier and darker than coal, asteroid 2005 YU55 is soaring at over 11 miles a second straight towards Earth and moon on its latest path through the inner solar system. This new radar image was acquired Nov. 7 by the 70-meter radio telescope at NASA's Deep Space Network in Goldstone, Calif., and shows the approaching space rock in unprecedented detail." Phil Plait has posted some information from NASA about just how they're doing the tricky job of tracking the asteroid.
That's a screen grab from a 240p Youtube video of an Alien egg.
What don't they want us to see?!
Finally had enough. Come see us over at https://soylentnews.org/
WTG Discovery with your asinine, needlessly fear-mongering video clip headline:
Discovery News Videos: Space: Doomsday Asteroid
Somebody should be fired...
The new radar image looks like the bald scalp and the eyes of Phantom, the Ghost who walks. (Walker when he comes out of the African Jungles on missions). Indrajal Comics used to reprint them in India. Wonder if he was as popular in USA/Europe. Wondering how I never even noticed the racial overtones when I was young.
sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
...Faster than a speeding bullet, able to level entire buildings in a single blow. ;-)
Is it bigger inside than outside? (Bonus points if you get the reference)
The article explains why the asteroid looks like a pixelated sprite taken from the era of Monkey Island.
For those that didn't want to bother reading both articles and just wanted to have a look at the image but then thought "WTF" after having a look at it:
"The individual pulses can be timed very accurately as well, so that the shape of the asteroid can be determined, too. If there is a bump on the asteroid, like a hill, then a pulse hitting that won’t travel quite as far as a pulse that hits a crater. It gets back sooner, and this can be measured. The spatial resolution of this method at the distance of YU 55 will be about 4 meters, so they’ll be able to make an image that’s about 100 pixels across of it."
image: http://news.discovery.com/space/2011/11/07/asteroid-2005-yu55-new-825.jpg
It looks computer generated to me.
I wanted to see a real life pic. Not an obvious photoshop on on an XT..
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
soaring at over 11 miles a second straight towards Earth
A bit sensationalist no? More accurate would be "not quite straight toward Earth" or "not toward Earth at all but at some point that passes close to Earth".
Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
Looks like some sort of minecraft creation...
The rock is bigger then Apophis and no name given?
Also, in this YouTube animation it looks like it will be a very close miss.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=unfti6ZByj0
It's a space station.
Even if the quality of the photo left is not the greatest, we already know that is not a cube-shaped spaceship. At least there is still hope that change the course by itself.
Wow. The thing is right next to the planet, probably would make a big "kaboom" if it actually hit, and all we have so far is a badly pixelated image.
I think the tech could use a bit more funding to have more advance warning.
I read the articles. I watched the video. But, I'm confused: why does the asteroid appear side-lit in the images?
If we're imaging the asteroid based on radar that's transmitted from the Earth, and the asteroid is heading nearly directly toward us, then we should be able to see images of the asteroid nearly full face on, rather than it appearing like a crescent moon with illumination from the sun, right? The radar illumination is from a source that spatially coincides with the receiving apparatus, so the image should appear more like the full moon.
What am I missing here?
Put my fist through my alarm clock with its ding-dong death inside my ear. - The Blackjacks.
If this is a "radar" image, where the telescope sent a pulse and got an image from the reflection, why in the picture does it look like the illumination is comming from the above the object? Shouldn't the whole visible face be illuminated? I would like to see all the detail received by the radar. If this is artificial illumination of a solid model build from the facing radar data, I wish the illuminator position would be near my point of view. If this is the actual radar image, then I am confused about the presentation.
Wow the article that OP linked to is amazing! The only problem with it is that there were not enough exclamation marks! Needs more exclamation marks!
Nobodies Prefect
Tidbits for Techs Technology Blog
ENHANCE!
Because Slashot is edited and populated by a bunch of ignorant know-it-alls, there are already a bunch of stunningly ignorant posts claiming skepticism about that "image".
If you'd all shut up and learn a little before vomiting your ignorance all over the site, you might have found this site:
http://planetary.org/blog/article/00002462/
Hint: it's not a "photo".
....elephants in size? How much olympic swimming pools does it displace if it was to hit the ocean?
I was promised a flying car. Where is my flying car?
Gravity ....
Wont this thing effect gravity the same way the moon pulls on the tides ?
One of the pre-requisites for a space elevator is a really heavy counter weight out in space. I for one am really disappointed that in 2011 - one year after we were supposed to be exploring monoliths in Jupiter orbit - we can't actually do anything than run around screaming and waving our hands - or taking grainy photographs. We should be watching glued to our TV sets as a group of brave astronauts guided from Earth by the best minds of our generation setup complex gravitational nets or other Star Trek type gizmo to capture this insanely fast hunk of rock so we can anchor it in geo-synchronous orbit as the first step to the "fountains of paradise' type space elevator Arthur C.Clake promised me we would have by now.
Watching the 24 news networks joke about Armageddon, followed immediately advertisements that talk about coal as "guaranteeing the future of mankind"; I can't help feeling we've peaked as a species. I for one am going to fund any genetic mutation experiments and AI work in the hope that we can create something better than us as a species.
Looks like we are pretty safe, but, it does pass through the moons orbit. Which makes me wonder, what if such an object hit the moon? While it probably wouldn't effect us much directly, what would the result be? We would certainly be able to witness the impact even without a telescope.
How would this effect our society? What would the moon look like afterwards? What kind of science could be done by observing this? Would we wake up as a society to the much more real threat of an impact on earth? Would this spur a renewed interest in space exploration?
Here's to hoping something hits the moon. I think it would be quite interesting.
-- Senior Software Engineer, Attorney appearance services, locallawyerapp.com.
Depending on the time line, wouldn't this have been the best time to try some literal rocket science an attempt to land a probe on surface and maybe setting up a transponder? Imagine that, we could start Lo-jacking these nearby celestial bodies.
How does a radio telescope image tell us that an object is "darker than coal"? Unless they meant "Has radio reflectivity less than that of coal"?
That is no moon.
I always assumed that the DSN antennas were used for spacecraft communications only, had no idea they were used for radio and radar astronomy as well.
Damn, if we had any real space capability in the US, 42 years after we walked on the Moon, we'd have been waiting to go out and catch the sucker, and bring it into a stable orbit at geosync. Then we'd have a *real* space station, to handle all kinds of communication, to beam solar power down, and as a station for interplanetary ships....
mark
Ying,
I'm reviewing your trajectory data, Just wanted to double check... I'm sure the astroid is going to miss us, but wanted to double triple check, you remember that probe that sort-of hit mars?
So your measurements of the acceleration were in inches per second, and slugs of force right? Thats what we have been using here at NASA, we never managed to convert to the metric system in the '70s.
As far as I can tell, this things going to miss us by a mile right? Or was that a kilometer?
Ross Youngblood
This is why we need a better space program. At that distance from the earth, we should be able to get pictures of the asteroid by sending up a craft with a couple of astronauts and some cameras.
Doesn't look anything like a spaceship.
Oliver's law of assumed responsibility: If you're seen fixing it, you will be blamed for breaking it.
whose name sadly I cannot look up at this time...
I started shooting the tornado with my 600 mm lens, then switched to the 500, then the 300. when I reached for the 24mm, I decided I had better get out of there
actual story in the NPPA magazine in the late 70s.
if this is supposed to be a new economy, how come they still want my old fashioned money?
Can't we come up with something better than an aircraft carrier for comparison? Does NASA have a list of comparison objects that says "400m = Aircraft Carrier"? First, aircraft carriers are about 330m x 75m x 20m. This thing is a 400m sphere, so it's a whole lot more massive. This thing would probably be a better comparison even though it's only 305m across. Anyone know any good rocks or holes on google earth that are 400m across?
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I, for one, welcome our new Minecraft overlords.
Here in Oklahoma, in the last 24 hours, we've had tornadoes, floods, and another earthquake. I'm not liking the looks of this asteroid thing.
Proverbs 21:19
Kelly Beatty's post (http://www.skyandtelescope.com/community/skyblog/observingblog/133013563.html) told me a lot more than the OP, plus there's an interesting animated gif showing the relative positions (in 2D) of the earth, moon, and 2005 YU55.
Circle the wagons and fire inward. Entropy increases without bounds.
If this thing was going to hit the Earth, is there any organisation or government who has a plan to deal with an asteroid impact threat?
It gripped her hand gently. 'Regret is for humans,' it said.
http://www.nasa.gov/multimedia/videogallery/index.html?collection_id=77341&media_id=119737731
...from The 5th Element; Duck and Cover!