Earth barely escaped a collision with two meteors Wednesday. The close encounter with the asteroids was considered a warning shot across the bow by astronauts and scientists preparing a global response to the meteor risk. Advancing observation and tracking technology has revealed a flurry of “near-earth objects” and increased human awareness of the asteroid threat. To investigate Earth’s opportunities for dodging a cosmic bullet, NASA is putting asteroid identification and surveillance on the front burner. NASA has been directed by the administration to seek out a way for sending astronauts to explore an asteroid that might be launched as early as 2019.
Asteroids go by uncomfortably close
Two small asteroids passed through the space between the Earth and moon Wednesday. Near-misses like that are commonplace, Donald Yeomans, manager of NASA’s Close Earth Network, told CNN, however many of the time they pass unnoticed. But the one-two punch that didn’t land Wednesday was different from most. The set of cosmic boulders were spotted days earlier and viewed closely. NASA said the Catalina Sky Survey near Tucson, Ariz., detected the asteroids Sunday morning during routine scanning. CNN quoted Yeomans as saying the current arsenal of telescopes devoted to near-earth objects is inadequate. He said humans were blissfully ignorant of the asteroid threat until scientists began looking for them in the 1990s and realized they were a problem.
Impact film creates a terrifying picture
Mankind’s hope lies in whether or not nations can collaborate. The Association of Space Explorers said only a unified effort will result in an adequate response to the asteroid threat. The ASE president, astronaut Chris Hadfield of Canada, told the Toronto Star that humans could be lucky if a meteor does not hit before they know how to proceed over it. In 2008, the United Nations received a report from the ASE defining the opportunities accessible for deflecting a killer meteor. To prevent an impact, technology on hand now could get the job done, the report said. One approach smashes a spacecraft into an asteroid, slowing it down enough so Earth can pass the impact point before it arrives. To be successful, mankind would need to start planning a quest anywhere from 10 to 18 years prior to the projected impact. If mankind fails to respond easily enough, the video below models the possible outcome.
National Aeronautics and Space Administration’s epic asteroid challenge
A manned mission to an asteroid by 2025 is being studied. The project is part of a plan to revamp human spaceflight submitted by the Obama administration earlier this year. The Houston Chronicle reports that despite the asteroid threat, Congress is fighting the president’s plan in favor of a more glamorous mission to the Moon. However, the company charged with building the brand new Orion spacecraft, Lockheed Martin, is already preparing an asteroid mission it says could launch by 2019. The objective of the mission would be to learn more about asteroids to better understand how to prevent them from striking Earth.
Discover more details on this subject
CNN
cnn.com/2010/US/09/08/earth.two.asteroids/index.html?npt=NP1
Toronto Star
thestar.com/article/857006–asteroid-warning-get-ready-for-the-big-one-astronauts-say
Houston Chronicle
chron.com/disp/story.mpl/nation/7188211.html
