Giant asteroid possibly on collision course with Earth - March 35, 2041
Ron Czapala
Posts: 2,418
http://ireport.cnn.com/docs/DOC-1137095
If astronomers are right, all life on this planet could be extinguished in less than 30 years from now. Scientists at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory have detected a large object the size of Manhattan possibly on a collision course with Earth. Using their Near-Earth Object Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (NEOWISE), the 10-mile wide object was found approximately 51 million miles from Earth. Scientists believe that during a close encounter with Mars, the asteroid was nudged slightly off its usual orbit and may currently be on a high speed collision course with our fragile planet.
The asteroid is calculated to have a potentially lethal encounter with the Earth on March 35, 2041.
Astronomers have placed the odds of an impact at 1 in 2.04, which is by far the most unprecedented risk ever faced to humanity, let alone from asteroids.
Such an impact could potentially end civilization as we know it.
If astronomers are right, all life on this planet could be extinguished in less than 30 years from now. Scientists at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory have detected a large object the size of Manhattan possibly on a collision course with Earth. Using their Near-Earth Object Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (NEOWISE), the 10-mile wide object was found approximately 51 million miles from Earth. Scientists believe that during a close encounter with Mars, the asteroid was nudged slightly off its usual orbit and may currently be on a high speed collision course with our fragile planet.
The asteroid is calculated to have a potentially lethal encounter with the Earth on March 35, 2041.
Astronomers have placed the odds of an impact at 1 in 2.04, which is by far the most unprecedented risk ever faced to humanity, let alone from asteroids.
Such an impact could potentially end civilization as we know it.
Comments
Nothing to worry about here.
A comment below that article...
Sounds about right to me!!
The statements above seem to assume that some how thirty years into the future we know the position of some orbiting rocks, that have travelled millions or billions of miles, to within 3000 miles or so.
I don't buy it.
We'll have at least prop 3 by then anyway.. problem solved!
http://weeklyworldnews.com/headlines/44608/giant-asteroid-heading-for-earth/
Apparently we survived the estimated 1:125 chance of getting hit by a 960 foot asteroid.
We might as well start posting "news" from Twitter and Tumblr now.
Nothing.
Same will happen when some random rock does actually terminate all life on Earth.
Ah well.
...And according to space-time relativity, time is a funny thing outside the clutches of our own Earth's mass. ... could explain why we haven't been back to the moon.
Here is a thought ... We basically orbit the Sun at 67 thousand miles per hour ... It takes roughly 9 minutes for the light from the Sun to reach the earth. At that speed, the light coming from the Sun that actually collides with the Earth was projected some 10 thousand miles in front of us in space before it left the Sun. Timing is everything.
Never mind relativity. We don't have accurate solutions for three bodies interacting with good old Newtonian gravity.
So, here we have a bunch of rocks flying around, basically in ways we cannot predict.
All we can do is simulate the situation and project into the future.
Fine, so my questions are really: How accurately do we know the positions of these things now? And their velocities? How the hell can you predict where they may be in thirty years time plus or minus 0.0000001 % ?
@Heater, in general we can't be very certain for low mass objects, and the orbital simulations I've seen display a predicted range of paths for such objects. This range of uncertainty grows over time as well. Unfortunately this works both ways because small objects which are not a current threat can be perturbed into new orbits where they are a threat. Fortunately for us, this numbers game has odds which greatly favor things missing us.
-Phil
I think if this asteroid hit us, we will need it by then, considering the direction everything is going.
By that time, the human will be equal to cattle, if not much sooner, (secretly, we are already cattle)
In 2041, I will be in my 90s... so expiration might be welcoming.
Why get all chicken little about an event so far in the future? And should we really trust the 'cry wolf' themes of today's media. If you read the financial junk out there, 2014 is going to crash the economy and cash will be worthless.
IOW, it takes a bit of calm objectivity to survive. Just jumping from panic to panic is likely to bring your own end quite near.
You have no say in your end, those who control the financial system do.
They determine if you(the masses) have a job, which then determines if you live on the street or not.
Caution, this video has a swear word in it.
According to my major credit card provider, the world will end in 90 days if I skip payments.
Personally, anything that projects an event further out than 5 years doesn't fit into my personal agenda. It is difficult enough to plan and project one's life out to about 5 years from now.
As of now, I will retire in 2032. That's 9 years and it'll be a hell of a firework - I'm fine with that.
Its been taken down now of course:
We know that the Earth has been stuck by MANY space rocks in the past...and will be stuck again in the future.
We know that life does not do well when it happens.
And still we avoid apparently at all costs implementing our technology to have a system in place to prevent it from happening.
At the present moment in human history, we are no better than the dinosaurs..likely worse...since they did not realize the danger..we do and still do nothing to prepare for it.
So does our species deserve to survive?
We also know that the odds of getting hit by a planet killer is extremely low for time intervals less than several million years. So in the stately pace of cosmic time we are doing something by cataloging these objects.
What criteria are you using to answer this question and who's the judge? If you could ask the philosopher Protagoras he would say that humans are the measure of all things, so we would answer yes to that question.
The only reason that you know of the danger is because scientists have told you. There is a large number of people working on this very problem on a daily basis. To say that we do nothing to prepare for it is a slap in the face to all those people.
Compare the time scale between extinction level impacts against the advancement of science and I think you will find that our survival looks quite favorable.
If you want a real problem to worry about, the heat death of the universe is a pretty serious one.
The hypothesis is that the solar system oscillates up and down through the galactic plane. The galactic plane presumably has higher star density than areas above and below. Passing through the plane is thought to disturb some of the icy Oort cloud bodies. When those bodies pass through the inner solar system, they are called comets. It takes about a million years for the "comet storm" to mature. The "Nemesis" is the cycle ... And all the gold in the world won't stop it.
We are overdue.
The cycle can be thought of as cosmic housekeeping or perhaps cosmic poker. Hopefully we will have time for our species to evolve fast enough to beat the ante, escape these earthly chains, and win the pot before the next round. If we don't, well we can be considered a failed bet, and the next lot of small creatures can play in the cosmic casino.
No disrespect intended...one of my friends is working the problem at NASA.
The limited amount of money spent on the problem IS the problem.
Meanwhile my conservative friends tell me that the heat death of the universe is just another climate change lie meant to scare aliens. ;<)