Asteroid likely on a possibilité collision course with Terra

[MathiasOfAthens]

http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2404480,00.asp
Interesting... Think many of us already knew there was an asteroid out there but its news that Nasa is preparing for it, or maybe not idk. Enjoy.

Anyway we will find out more later this month:

NASA is scheduled to officially announce details of its plan to land astronauts on an asteroid at the Japan Geoscience Union Meeting later this month, The Telegraph reported. The U.S. space agency reportedly hopes to send a robot probe to an asteroid by 2016 and begin sending manned missions to them beginning in the late 2020s.

NASA is currently training astronauts to land on asteroids and hopes to send humans to one of the distant space rocks in about a decade, The Telegraph reported over the weekend. As in the movie Armageddon, one motivation for the endeavor is to figure out a way to destroy or deflect a large asteroid that could be on a collision course with Earth.
In June, a group of astronauts will begin learning how to operate vehicles and move about on asteroids, according to the U.K. newspaper, which interviewed a British astronaut who is participating in the training program.
Major Tim Peake, an astronaut with the European Space Agency, told The Telegraph that a manned mission to intercept an incoming asteroid would be a last resort but could prove necessary because even large space objects can be difficult to detect.
"With enough warning we would probably send a robotic mission to deflect an asteroid, but if something is spotted late and is big enough we might come into Armageddon type scenarios where we may have to look at manned missions to deflect it," the ESA astronaut was quoted as saying.
Peake, formerly a test helicopter pilot, told the newspaper that "an asteroid mission of up to a year is definitely achievable" with technology that's currently available or being developed.
Asteroids are primarily located in a belt beyond the orbit of Mars, but some "near-Earth" objects swing much closer to our planet—sometimes even within 100,000 miles or closer, obviously, when they strike us. Still, The Telegraph noted that a mission to visit an asteroid would likely take space explorers much further from Earth than the 239,000 miles traversed by NASA's Apollo astronauts when they visited the Moon.
Aside from getting about safely on the near-zero gravity conditions on an asteroid, landing on such small, fast-moving objects could prove thorny.
NASA is scheduled to officially announce details of its plan to land astronauts on an asteroid at the Japan Geoscience Union Meeting later this month, The Telegraph reported. The U.S. space agency reportedly hopes to send a robot probe to an asteroid by 2016 and begin sending manned missions to them beginning in the late 2020s.
The presentation in Japan reportedly details a manned mission that would "rendezvous with an asteroid up to three million miles from the Earth, taking around a year to make the entire round trip." The astronauts aboard that mission might stay on the asteroid for as long as month.
A group led by commercial spaceflight pioneers Eric Anderson and Peter Diamandis recently formed a company, Planetary Resources, which will also attempt to visit asteroids by the end of the decade. Planetary Resources said last month that it planned to send robotic spacecraft to near-Earth asteroids to mine water and metals, which along with exploration and planetary safety could also be an objective of the NASA project.

[Niles Crane]

Unless Bruce Willis goes on the mission, I have no faith in their success.

[MathiasOfAthens]

Bruce Willis only sacrificed himself. We need Ben Aflect.. without him they will not have the right drill to keep drilling.

[Col. Tartleton]

Bruce Willis only sacrificed himself. We need Ben Aflect.. without him they will not have the right drill to keep drilling.

I like Bruce. Send Matt Damon with Affleck instead. A. He's a moron. B. He's Jason Bourne.

[mrmouth]

This kind of thing is great because it is multifaceted. You are talking about mining for resources, and actually using asteroids as jumping off points that can shave months off of a potential mission to Mars, etc. Much more effective than the moon base that Obama got blasted for "abandoning."

However, I would have to think that we could shave several years off of this project if we had the appropriate level of concern over this. It would truly suck if we got hit by something that fell into this category before the project was complete. The ultimate cosmic sucker punch concept is still alive and well even with the amount of people tracking these objects. There is still that part of the sky that we cannot always see.

Really isn't any reason for there to not be a new space race around the idea of stopping the inevitable space rock from killing all of us.

[Menelik_I]

I like Bruce. Send Matt Damon with Affleck instead. A. He's a moron. B. He's Jason Bourne.

We might need a bigger shuttle to accommodate most of the Film Actors Guild (F.A.G.) personnel, I heard mushy brains is a perfect fissile material.

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

I just hope that if there is an asteroid, that no Greenie idiot will start about sending the necessary nukes in orbit to deflect it.

[Sphere]

I am for sending Ben Afleck on a suicide mission whether the Earth is in jeopardy or not.

[Arbitrary Crusader]

I am for sending Ben Afleck on a suicide mission whether the Earth is in jeopardy or not.

I agree as the others had said, however I would like to add Owen Wilson to the list.

[Treize]

The question would be: how many megatons?

[Holger Danske]

The question would be: how many megatons?

All of them!

[The Despondent Mind]

"Just nuke the damn thing "

[florin87]

nuking it would be the most moronic thing we've ever done as a species. because:

a) the nukes might do
b) the nukes might work and instead of one asteroid we have 5. so where originally only one dead continent we'd now have 5 of them.

[Menelik_I]

nuking it would be the most moronic thing we've ever done as a species. because:

a) the nukes might do
b) the nukes might work and instead of one asteroid we have 5. so where originally only one dead continent we'd now have 5 of them.

Increase the number of nukes until desired result is achieved.

[Logios]

nuking it would be the most moronic thing we've ever done as a species. because:

a) the nukes might do
b) the nukes might work and instead of one asteroid we have 5. so where originally only one dead continent we'd now have 5 of them.

c) whatever hits us will be radioactive.

There was a related topic on this recently, but the article is relevant enough.
http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showthread.php?t=518156

[MathiasOfAthens]

nuking it would be the most moronic thing we've ever done as a species. because:

a) the nukes might do
b) the nukes might work and instead of one asteroid we have 5. so where originally only one dead continent we'd now have 5 of them.

Dude one asteroid is all that is needed to wipe out all life on Earth.

[DisgruntledGoat]

Dude one asteroid is all that is needed to wipe out all life on Earth.

One VERY VERY large asteroid.

Is this topic regarding Apophis? Cause the chances of that striking the earth are quite low. And even if it does it will likely hit in the Pacific ocean. Not to much to worry about. It certainly isn't a "earth killer" even if it did hit land. It would suck but it would end the world.

[florin87]

Dude one asteroid is all that is needed to wipe out all life on Earth.

that would have to be a pretty mothering big asteroid, in which case nukes won't even scratch it much less split it in half.
for reference: the asteroid (though recent findings point out to two gigantic asteroid impacts 300.000 years apart) that wiped out the dinosaurs only did so because it landed on earth's largest iridium deposit, and it was the biggest to ever hit the earth since life appeared.

Increase the number of nukes until desired result is achieved.

we could launch our entire nuclear arsenal at it and we'd still only be able to transform it from a "space missile" to a "space shotgun blast". now imagine thousands of burning rock and metal fragments entering our atmosphere, heating it to temperatures that make a volcano seem like a freezer. not a good thing.
in fact it's worse, because if the atmosphere ignites everything dies, while if an asteroid hits only the dominant species die.

[Menelik_I]

we could launch our entire nuclear arsenal at it and we'd still only be able to transform it from a "space missile" to a "space shotgun blast". now imagine thousands of burning rock and metal fragments entering our atmosphere, heating it to temperatures that make a volcano seem like a freezer. not a good thing.
in fact it's worse, because if the atmosphere ignites everything dies, while if an asteroid hits only the dominant species die.

You don't know what you are talking about.

The earth travels at +5k Km/h around the sun, any deflection of the asteroid by a few degrees beyond lunar orbit will result in a difference in trajectory of tens of 10s' of kilometers.

And if the asteroid is put in pieces, all the pieces are not going to magically follow the same trajectory towards earth, they are going to be blown around 360.

You could deal with the fragments using sequential detonations, to reduce the speed of any fragments and having them miss earth.

In any talk about asteroid and earth, remember that Earth is rotating around the sun at great speed and that small changes in angles in space result in great trajectory changes after 500 000 Km.

ETA:

The earth entire nuclear arsenal is more than enough to blow up the biggest asteroids many times over. Anything below 5km in diameters would be a peace of cake.

[chamaeleo]

You don't know what you are talking about.

The earth travels at +5k Km/h around the sun, any deflection of the asteroid by a few degrees beyond lunar orbit will result in a difference in trajectory of tens of 10s' of kilometers.

And if the asteroid is put in pieces, all the pieces are not going to magically follow the same trajectory towards earth, they are going to be blown around 360.

You could deal with the fragments using sequential detonations, to reduce the speed of any fragments and having them miss earth.

In any talk about asteroid and earth, remember that Earth is rotating around the sun at great speed and that small changes in angles in space result in great trajectory changes after 500 000 Km.

ETA:

The earth entire nuclear arsenal is more than enough to blow up the biggest asteroids many times over. Anything below 5km in diameters would be a peace of cake.

Actually...that's the ONE thing he did get (partly) correct!

What is the kinetic energy of this thing?

What is the energetic requirement needed for a bomb to not only negate all that kinetic energy, but also blast it in a 360 spread (plus Z axis)? "Magically follow." Huh. Nice. That phrase can only be described as 'pre-Newtonian'; First Law to be precise...

Best solution would be to put a bomb on the asteroid just as it passes on its latest milkrun, explode it a few days later to give it a 'nudge', thus changing its trajectory relatively early in its orbit...literally the most bang for the buck. Trying to impede the thing after its already headed right for us would be much more difficult.

[MathiasOfAthens]

that would have to be a pretty mothering big asteroid, in which case nukes won't even scratch it much less split it in half.
for reference: the asteroid (though recent findings point out to two gigantic asteroid impacts 300.000 years apart) that wiped out the dinosaurs only did so because it landed on earth's largest iridium deposit, and it was the biggest to ever hit the earth since life appeared.

Wow thats a pretty lucky shot.