These periodic asteroids that get closer and closer with each pass have to pass through what's called a Earth gravitational keyhole to ensure an impact on the next pass. Apparently it's a lot easier to deflect an asteroid from a keyhole trajectory than an impact trajectory, so they'll be looking to try that as a preemptive measure. The Chicxulub asteroid wasn't in that kind of trajectory, aiming straight for Earth on its first pass, so we'll still need a backup for that kind of situation.
They now have fossilized remains proving that birds already existed in the dinosaur era. They were survivors. It helps to not require a lot of food, being able to travel long distances effortlessly in search of food, and having the best body insulation system in the world.
It could have an expensive code bug too.
Let USAF, NASA, ESA, Russia, China, Musk, and Bezos all fire away at it, ideally from the same side.
The video would have been better if the uploader had used DOA by the Foo Fighters for the audio. Or failing that, something by Wagner. ;-)
You worry too much. To a pathological extent, too.
Nostradamus predicted this would happen, so bank on it:
Main objection to nukes is, because it's a near Earth intercept, gravity will bring all the fallout back to Earth.
Surely you jest??
bitrex snipped-for-privacy@example.net wrote in news:KTsqI.57311$ snipped-for-privacy@fx09.iad:
200 million years for turtles.Cursitor Doom snipped-for-privacy@nowhere.com wrote in news: snipped-for-privacy@4ax.com:
Shirley, you know better.
I wonder how Fred thinks that we know this? All we know about the trajectory of the Chicxulub impactor was that it intercepted the earth. The link in his original post identified it as more likely to have been a a comet-like object from way out in the Oort Cloud, but it's trajectory is pure speculation.
Nah. If the momentum transfer is enough for the asteroid to miss, the ejecta will miss by a much larger margin.
Cheers
Phil Hobbs
It would be gas and dust and gravel anyhow. A nice safe light show.
Not if it were as radioactive as all the Pacific tests combined. The background radiation increase in the '50s and '60s was considerable (and continuing).
Cheers
Phil Hobbs
Correct me if I'm wrong, but the nuke initial detonation should propagate at a rate on the order of meters per microsecond, which is about three orders of magnitude faster than the motion of the asteroid. It will therefore propel ejecta anywhere it wants to end up and will not be predictable. The only group advocating nuking an incoming asteroid is the usual criminal collaboration of Lawrence Livermore and the USAF. They also claim an ordinary H-bomb won't do the job, it has to be a neutron bomb.
We might have a bunch of available bombs, but slapping together a delivery vehicle, adequate sensor technology, aka high res radar, and in-fight guidance and control, together with possibly terminal homing technology for the missile warhead, are all a VERY VERY big deal that isn't going to happen quickly (gross understatement here).
Forget them and go with the kinetic impactor approach.
Not so. The plasma pressure will send the ejecta out into probably 2*pi steradians, but with a delta-V many orders of magnitude higher than that of the asteroid. Momentum is conserved, so if you knock a million tons of stuff off a trillion-ton asteroid, then (to within a factor of order unity) its delta-V will be a million times higher than the asteroid's. If the asteroid misses by even 10000 km, the ejecta will miss by a solar system's worth.
Cheers
Phil Hobbs
My English is showing--should have been "a quadrillion-ton asteroid". ;)
Cheers
Phil Hobbs
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