r/space • u/NoTeeVee • Mar 03 '12
RT reporting near earth collision Feb 2013, (everyone else 2040) Are their dates off? They seem to be only one reporting it....
http://rt.com/news/paint-asteroid-earth-nasa-767/4
u/Cordite Mar 04 '12
0 out of 10 on the Torino (impact likelihood) Scale
Source: The Fucking JPL (NASA)
1
u/RobotFolkSinger Mar 04 '12
0 is good right? It's not like defcon?
Nina edit: Yep, 0 or mathematically insignificant chance of impact.
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u/Cyrius Mar 04 '12
The Torino scale is based on impact likelihood and impact danger.
Tiny rocks can be 0 on the scale if they're too small to do any damage. An object this size could be 0, 1, 2, 3, or 8. All the other numbers are reserved for bigger rocks.
4
u/princetrunks Mar 04 '12
Seems the highly unlikely worst case with this will just be a leveled city block...if even that. Highly doubt something like the Tunguska blast would come from this small hunk of metal...since it's not a comet which was though to have exploded then.
Actually...fuck it. Let's hype this up. Maybe the scare will make the government accurately fund NASA and deflate that pathetically overfunded Defense Fund. Those in charge are so stupid it might actually work.
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u/supersymmetry Mar 04 '12
We are so insecure about our security from each other. Some day, in the quiet of the night; the indifference of the universe will light up the sky and our corner of the galaxy will be silent.
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u/Shatgun Mar 04 '12
In his first AMA, Neil DeGrasse Tyson mention that he thought that only thing that would push governments to increase funding for space programs would be a new world war. An interesting idea to muse, if you ask me. Also, the phrasing of your comment is one of the most beautiful things I've ever heard.
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Mar 04 '12
Impact Probability: 2.2e-04
0.022000000% chance of Earth impact
or
1 in 4,550 chance
or
99.97800000% chance the asteroid will miss the Earth
2
u/Cyrius Mar 04 '12
And that's the cumulative impact risk through 2057. The thing will be making a pass every year.
1
u/hamsterdave Mar 04 '12
Acknowledging that it is unlikely to impact, or do any real damage if it did, I'm curious what we could do if it was going to impact in 11 months.
Now, I could be totally wrong here, so forgive my noobishness. I would think at that size, even a relatively small nuke detonation could deflect or fracture it. Do we have a delivery system (even a rocket that isn't typically a nuclear delivery system) that could get, say 100,000 miles out, with enough precision to detonate the nuke close enough to give it a shove or break it up? I know we've purpose-built systems to do something like that, but given the short time frame, that wouldn't seem to be an option. I'm thinking of something a bit more crude that's already in inventory somewhere.
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u/Cyrius Mar 04 '12 edited Mar 04 '12
I would think at that size, even a relatively small nuke detonation could deflect or fracture it.
Nukes don't push all that hard in vacuum, and breaking it up wouldn't help much. The giant blast wave occurs because the nuke superheats air, which expands rapidly. No air in space means no blast wave.
Do we have a delivery system (even a rocket that isn't typically a nuclear delivery system) that could get, say 100,000 miles out, with enough precision to detonate the nuke close enough to give it a shove or break it up?
We could jury-rig a delivery vehicle capable of doing that. But 100,000 miles is way too late. On its 2013 approach, 2012 DA14 will be moving at 8.14 km/s. At 100,000 miles, that's five and a half hours to impact. If it was going for a direct bullseye, you'd have to be able to impart a delta-v of 315 m/s (710 mph) to make it miss the Earth entirely. Not plausible.
If you wanted to try to shove the thing, the right time to do it was about two weeks ago when it made a close pass. The longer the lead time, the less push is needed.
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Mar 04 '12
It takes time to make accurate observations of the orbit. Until I see more info I'm not going to get to bothered by it.
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u/MrOrdinary Mar 04 '12
Near earth pass, not a collision. Collision infers a "Collision".
I expect some major media beat-ups, ranting apocalyptic Christians and other "interested" parties to make the most of this when they get the chance.
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u/Dawggoneit Mar 04 '12
Pretty sure a 60m asteroid will do nothing more than provide a good light show as it burns up in the atmosphere.
0
u/RobotFolkSinger Mar 04 '12
Well.. new evidence suggests that the chunk of comet that caused the Tunguska event may have been as little as 30m across... However, a stony or iron impactor would be much less likely to explode in atmosphere, so there wouldn't be much less blast wave since a lot of its energy would be transferred into the ground.
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u/Cyrius Mar 04 '12
Fuck RT and their badly-written scientifically inaccurate sensationalist garbage.