Here is the wikipedia page explaining the Torino Scale. I still wouldn't worry about it until the thing hit at least a 8 or so.
Unfortunately, you didn't read the page correctly. I can't really blame you for that because the scale's a little wacky.
The Torino Scale combines both kinetic energy and probability of impact. This asteroid will never be an 8 on the scale because it's too big. The only possible values for it are 1,2,4,5, and 9. A rough reading says that it'll hit 5 when the probability goes to around 10%. It'll only hit 9 when impact is a virtual certainty (>99%).
If it's at 5 in 2025, I wouldn't put down money on a house located in whatever probable impact zone they've calculated by then.
Being on the "other side" of the planet from the point of impact wont help you if that happens to be Hawai.
There are these things, they are called "continents". A rock dropped into the South Atlantic isn't going to cause a significant tsunami at Hawaii without causing bigger problems.
Also, isn't this estimation based on the "perfect" scenario? Ie. No outside forces being exerted on the rock before it hits us? Even though 30 years is a drop in the universe's bucket in terms of time, there is a lot that could possibly alter the course.
The only forces likely to have any significant effect on the rock are the gravitational attractions of the major planets. These are easily predictable with very good accuracy on this timescale.
I'm a rugged individualist, but I'm at a loss of how to prepare for a heat pulse. The pulse will destroy all individual housing. Essentially every home will burn.
"...and this little piggy built his house out of reinforced concrete."
The impact effects calculator says that there would be no significant thermal effects from this rock. You'd still have to worry about the shock wave though.
Given that we've got more than 24 years until any potential impact, I'm not terribly worried. Even if the odds shoot up to 99+% tomorrow, we've got time to prepare. If we can predict the impact point with any accuracy, it would be worth it to just move everyone out of the way.
I ran the calculation at the same site, but using the size of the one we're supposedly talking about, porous rock instead of dense rock or iron, and I dropped it into the mid-Atlantic, the earth being 74% covered by water after all.
It broke up, there was no fireball, and I could make more impact overpressure (I chose to be 1,800 km from the impact site) by clapping my hands real hard.
Then again, an impact like "mine" happens every 4,000 years or so.
Note that the calculator does not include tsunami.
Is sad. When anybody can change the entire entry without anybody noticing.. the "Douche" entry was insulting some girl with first and last name for about a week or two before it was changed.
So why didn't you fix it? It would have been less effort than writing that message.
It's surprising, how huge effect a visual layout can have. At that time, I was only used to see ugly, unprofessional-looking open source project homepages. But PostgreSQL has always been an exception. In my opinion they have always had a very good-looking web site.
Back around when Wikipedia upgraded its software and gained a new default appearance, there were concerns expressed that because it was slick and polished, people wouldn't get the idea that they could change it. And quite a few of them actually don't.
Strange too that no one ever talks about the lag in wired communications even though it is there. I remember as a child talking with my Aunt and Uncle living in Europe at the time on the phone. You really had a problem with knowing when the other person was speaking because of the lag.
Electrical/optical latency to Europe from the US is negligible on a conversational timescale. However, if the phone call was being bounced off a geostationary communications satellite, that would have easily added a quarter-second delay.
Yes, but I would assume that the GPS records the speed of the cell phone, not the sctual speed of the car. If you hit something, the kinetic energy of the phone would keep it moving, unless it was secured to the car somehow. It would then fly into an object, and may stop when it hits that. That makes the calculations pretty complicated, I would think...
It'd still take less than a second to decelerate to zero, assuming a perfect straight-on collision without the phone flying loose. (Obviously, this all ignores a glancing blow where the car spins around afterwards)
Say the car's 15 feet long. If it crashes into an overpass support, do you really think it's going to take more than a second to come to a stop (excluding parts thrown loose)? It's moving so fast it only takes a few hundredths of a second to travel its own body length.
The only way for it to take more than a fraction of a second is for the overpass support to actually break loose and travel with the car, thus allowing for a lower negative acceleration.
I find it somewhat reasurring that MediaWiki is used to run Wikipedia. Since they already have a huge amount of preexisting content, it's in their best interests to make migration from one version to the next as easy as possible.
Although the upgrade to 1.4 is almost certain to be completely automated, it's probably still going to be painful. There are several database schema changes being discussed, which will cause a decent amount of downtime for conversion on a large Mediawiki database.
100 systems is what, the first 10 light years radius? (If that?)
10 light years only gets you up to 9 systems, none of them similar to ours (Alpha Centauri A is very similar to Sol, but you've got Alpha Centauri B to worry about). You go out to 15 light years and you get about 30 systems, including some interesting buggers like Epsilon Eridane, Epsilon Indi, and everyone's favorite, Tau Ceti.
You're not too far off though. Sources say 20 ly puts you just over 100 stars with 79 systems. Only five are type G stars like Sol.
Slashdot Mirror
Unfortunately, you didn't read the page correctly. I can't really blame you for that because the scale's a little wacky.
The Torino Scale combines both kinetic energy and probability of impact. This asteroid will never be an 8 on the scale because it's too big. The only possible values for it are 1,2,4,5, and 9. A rough reading says that it'll hit 5 when the probability goes to around 10%. It'll only hit 9 when impact is a virtual certainty (>99%).
If it's at 5 in 2025, I wouldn't put down money on a house located in whatever probable impact zone they've calculated by then.
I screwed up my quoting :(
There are these things, they are called "continents". A rock dropped into the South Atlantic isn't going to cause a significant tsunami at Hawaii without causing bigger problems.
Also, Hawaii is mountainous..
The only forces likely to have any significant effect on the rock are the gravitational attractions of the major planets. These are easily predictable with very good accuracy on this timescale.
"...and this little piggy built his house out of reinforced concrete."
The impact effects calculator says that there would be no significant thermal effects from this rock. You'd still have to worry about the shock wave though.
Given that we've got more than 24 years until any potential impact, I'm not terribly worried. Even if the odds shoot up to 99+% tomorrow, we've got time to prepare. If we can predict the impact point with any accuracy, it would be worth it to just move everyone out of the way.
It broke up, there was no fireball, and I could make more impact overpressure (I chose to be 1,800 km from the impact site) by clapping my hands real hard.
Then again, an impact like "mine" happens every 4,000 years or so.
Note that the calculator does not include tsunami.
It's also my sister's birthday. At least I'll have an excuse for not remembering!
So why didn't you fix it? It would have been less effort than writing that message.
The Yellow Dog Linux article has barely been touched in the last year, and has not been vandalized once in that time (as of this post).
The same amount it costs somebody to revert a trashed Wikipedia article to its previous non-trashed state.
Back around when Wikipedia upgraded its software and gained a new default appearance, there were concerns expressed that because it was slick and polished, people wouldn't get the idea that they could change it. And quite a few of them actually don't.
Electrical/optical latency to Europe from the US is negligible on a conversational timescale. However, if the phone call was being bounced off a geostationary communications satellite, that would have easily added a quarter-second delay.
It's the Bomis.com logo. I think the boat is the same one as in the photo on Jimbo's site, but with that U-shaped piece moved downward.
It'd still take less than a second to decelerate to zero, assuming a perfect straight-on collision without the phone flying loose. (Obviously, this all ignores a glancing blow where the car spins around afterwards)
A car going 220 mph is moving at
.Say the car's 15 feet long. If it crashes into an overpass support, do you really think it's going to take more than a second to come to a stop (excluding parts thrown loose)? It's moving so fast it only takes a few hundredths of a second to travel its own body length.
The only way for it to take more than a fraction of a second is for the overpass support to actually break loose and travel with the car, thus allowing for a lower negative acceleration.
I really like how he worked in AYB at the same time.
I'd just be happy if they brought back Quickies.
What worries me is one of the Private Dubbo lines from Halo 1:
Dubbo was one of the male UNSC Marines.
It'd be nicer if he didn't use 's to make a plural of "iPod".
Although the upgrade to 1.4 is almost certain to be completely automated, it's probably still going to be painful. There are several database schema changes being discussed, which will cause a decent amount of downtime for conversion on a large Mediawiki database.
Hmmm.
"Thanks for experimenting with Wikipedia. Your test worked, and has now been removed."
Asked and answered.
Given some of the garbage they've had on Enterprise, a shirtless Shatner fighting a guy in a rubber suit would be an improvement.
10 light years only gets you up to 9 systems, none of them similar to ours (Alpha Centauri A is very similar to Sol, but you've got Alpha Centauri B to worry about). You go out to 15 light years and you get about 30 systems, including some interesting buggers like Epsilon Eridane, Epsilon Indi, and everyone's favorite, Tau Ceti.
You're not too far off though. Sources say 20 ly puts you just over 100 stars with 79 systems. Only five are type G stars like Sol.