ESA Carries Out Asteroid Impact Drill

Zothecula writes: If there were any dinosaurs around, they could tell you that an asteroid impact can ruin your whole day. But if we did learn that one was actually going to strike the Earth in a month, what would the authorities do? To find out, the European Space Agency held its first ever mock asteroid drill to work on solutions and identify problems in how to handle such a catastrophe.

Comments

Duck & Cover?

[Irate Engineer]

For the size of the asteroids they are considering, the response would be similar to that of of a nuclear strike, without the radiation. For ones the size of Chixulub, I think the plan should be to party like it was the end of the world.

Re:Duck & Cover?

[rtb61]

Except the people stuck on the surface are likely to take offence and bury those rich and greedy types as well as politicians and leave them there. Likely best action apart from trying to deflect the asteroid, give everyone a free supply of happy pills to last until the impact, lots and lots of happy pills. It wont help with the impact but most certainly will mitigate the harm caused by people acting out against other people. In fact inserting the happy drugs right into the food and water supply would make sense.

In a more serious vein, establishment of distributed localised support system that well seek and readily accept volunteers, so individuals can focus on supporting their local community rather than dwelling upon their own circumstance. Establishing that mutual support network well before hand, one that includes the whole community, would make sense.

Re:Duck & Cover?

[cavreader]

I am going to have to go with the lots of Happy pills idea.

Re:Duck & Cover?

[ArsonSmith]

The problem with "give everybody X" schemes is where are all the X going to come from?

Re:Duck & Cover?

[JaredOfEuropa]

For a small asteroid, the best response is not to do nothing, but to figure out where the thing is going to hit, and if it's going to hit a populated area, advise the authorities to start an evacuation or advise people to seek shelter. That is what ESA's exercise was about: can they gather, process, and share the right information in a timely manner?

Re:Duck & Cover?

[Immerman]

Because cowering under your desk will protect you from a nuclear blast!

That's got to be one of the more effective fear-mongering campaigns ever deployed - got a whole generation indoctrinated from childhood to cower in fear under the skirts of a commensurately empowered government.

Re:Duck & Cover?

[smooth wombat]

Because cowering under your desk will protect you from a nuclear blast!

It wasn't so much protection from the blast but from falling debris. If we assume one was far enough away from the blast to not be fried, getting under a desk would offer some protection from ceiling tiles and such which might fall, similar to how standing in a doorway during an earthquake offers some protection if you can't immediately get out.

This idea is still orders of magnitude better than former head of Homeland Security (and former Governor of my state who got the pension crisis rolling) Tom Ridge telling people to use duct tape to seal their windows and doors to protect them from chemical or biological attacks.

Drill? Damn you Slashdot!

[fustakrakich]

You had me thinking the lander came back to life.

Too bad Ray Nagin never practiced shit hitting the

[raymorris]

The odds of a significant asteroid impact any time soon seem quite remote, but I think the exercise of having many agencies practice their coordination for a major event might come in handy. Here in Texas we drill all sorts of unlikely scenarios. We probably never drilled a major' fertilizer plant explosion in West, but we were prepared to mobilize anywhere, for any reason.

Official Transcript of Drill

[argStyopa]

Moderator: OK folks, drill is beginning.
Breathless Lacky: Attention important people! Deep space radar shows that a major asteroid strike is due in less than a week! It is likely to have global damage potential, scouring the seas and filling the skies with fire. All human life, in fact all life on earth is potentially at risk.
VIP1: Thank you. Do we have a spaceship that we can use to get away?
VIP2: No, sir. ... ... ...
VIP1: OK, well then, let's call this one complete. Drill ended after 0 minutes, 28 seconds:, Asteroid 1, Earth 0. Thank you all for your participation. Please join us next year, we're shooting for 30 seconds.

My plan

[Neil Boekend]

In a Chicxulub sized impact event my plan is to die. I like to set achievable goals.