Britannist

From today's Sun (page 14):

(notice that the Sun only mentions towards the end of the story that there is only a small chance the earth would be hit :? :roll: )

'Massive asteroid horror'

A huge asteroid could smash into Earth on Halloween Day 2041 :shock: .

The space rock has been labelled 2006 XG1 by astronomers.

It would blast a crater ten miles wide and half a mile deep if it hit Earth and its explosion would equal 1700 megatons of TNT - enough to wipe out a city .

There is a one in 40, 000 chance of the asteroid hitting the Earth. The most likely scenario is that it will whizz past the Earth just 3000 miles away - a hair's breath considering that the moon is 250, 000 miles from Earth.

NASA and the European Space Agency (not part of the EU) are planning armageddon-style missions to change the course of asteroids said Ribon Scagell from the UK Society for Popular Astronomy 8) .

Hartlepool

Nothing to worry about,Prezza is running the show.

Britannist

They all keep going on about alleged global warming but seem to ignore the very real threat of a large rock slamming into the centre of a big city at great speed causing a huge loss of life. Global warming (if it exists) hasn't resulted in the loss of life of anyone.

Perhaps global warming is an elitist issue for the chattering classes of the posh parts of London while an asteroid heading for Earth doesn't quite fit in as a discussion point at dinner parties. Especially if it was first reported in the Sun - not the favourite 'paper of the Guardian-reading leftist snobs who probably pollute more than the rest of us put together.

Maybe objects hitting the Earth from space are not an issue with the wine-and-cheese socialist chattering classes because they are preoccupied with wanting to use the issue of alleged global warming instead as a way of putting 'Green' (anti-carbon) surcharges on cheap air flight tickets to stop 'the masses' flying to what used to be their exclusive destinations.

Clippo

I'll desist from replying to your GW comments which by now I'm sure you know what I would write, Brittanist, but you wrote:-

I saw a program on TV during the last year about 'green glass' found in the Egyptian desert. The presenters went on to say that these had probably been formed, not by lightning strikes as previously assumed, but by smallish, bolides (can't remember the size sorry, I think as small as 100metres across). But when these hit earth they explode just above the surface of earth, rather than blasting a really deep crater. This means most of the energy is released in a nuclear bomb like surface blast. What's this all got to do with NASA's program - well, it is suggested that if we disintegrated a rogue asteroid, lots of little bolides, or bomblets would ultimately be horrendously worse that one big crater.
You now have my complete knowledge on this topic

No, I just followed it up a bit here http://www.skepticreport.com/mythsmy...esertglass.htm

another site, didn't keep the link claims to have found a crater but in the TV program they said something like this had happened in SE Asia & may have decimated early mankind there.

Britannist

Thank you for that interesting article Clippo. I can't help feeling that the Sun only printed this news story because there wasn't that much 'real' news when they went to press (today's Sun was obviously put together before the death of Saddam Hussein).

I expect tomorrow the Sun will have pages on Saddam Hussein (i.e. 'real' news) and stories on asteroids will remain 'on file' and not used.

The asteroid in question has actually been covered in news reports over the last few years.

And the Sun editor responsible was obviously so worried about the asteroid that it got pride of place on page 14 of the newspaper. :twisted:

I think the newspapers have a whole load of stories about asteroids, loch-ness monsters, animals that got left behind and found their way home over 300 miles etc. on file for use when the senior journalists are on holiday and/or when there's not much happening.

mkpdavies

It's happened before, it'll happen again unless we improve our technology enough to deal with it.

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Lazyguy

or maybe it will hit the moon? Or Asplode? Or maybe it will become another moon?

John Carter

You sounded just like Morgan Freeman when you typed that.

spaman

This kind of threat like GW has been hyped beyond anything science can prove..... they just work on likelyhoods.....but they have grossly overstated the possibility of major damage from a space rock..

Let's face it... we cannot trust anybody on GW, tell me why we should believe the 'meteroid hits the Earth and destroys all life theory'

......oh, with space rocks there is no political angle and nobody will gain out of it - ohno.. you can bet somebody somewhere is making a fast buck or something out of it...


I'm not so much saying they lied on this one, more that their science is not as good as they think it is...but I wouldn't exclude any lies

Besoeker

There is enough data to say that global warming is happening.
Has it killed anyone?
As I recall, Paris a couple of years ago had a substantial number of deaths during a summer with significantly above average temperatures.
The debate is about how much, if any, global warming is man made.

As for the rock.
Using the figures reportedly from the Sun (they looked at someof the information on Wilipedia?) the probability that it will miss earth is 99.99750%
Other data makes it 99.99870%

Real threat?
I suppose so. But just very remote.