Fear Mongering...Space edition?

[yetgdhfgh]

Yeah, just like 2012 was very real as well.

I do like, though, how your planet's very survival is still influenced by money. Shows how retarded of a race humans are.

The Tunguska metoer that hit siberia in 1908 was a very real event http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tunguska_event

It hit the earth with the power of about 30 megatons which is about a thousand times more powerful than the atom bomb that destroyed Hiroshima

This event even happened a few months ago but on a much much smaller scale

Its happened throughout earths history our planet is scarred by such events

[Rukentuts]

Here's what an asteroid just six miles wide accomplished: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chicxulub_crater#Effects

Nothing like the force 100 Teratons of TNT (2 million Tsar Bombas) between friends.

[Masark]

If the US government can afford to hand out more money to inept, failing banks than what NASA has received over its entire existence, then surely they can afford to step up the funding with a couple of billion dollars.

FTFY.

From 1958 to 2012, NASA has received approximately $871 billion dollars, inflation adjusted to 2007.

The Fed's quantitative easing programs have spent in excess of double that.

[Payday]

FTFY.

From 1958 to 2012, NASA has received approximately $871 billion dollars, inflation adjusted to 2007.

The Fed's quantitative easing programs have spent in excess of double that.

So about half of the annual US Defense budget then.

[Stir]

It's not fear mongering... It's sensation press. They use phrasing such as that because it gets people excited, and people will buy the stuff. Basically: What you're looking at is entertainment.

[Adam Jensen]

Yeah, just like 2012 was very real as well.

I do like, though, how your planet's very survival is still influenced by money. Shows how retarded of a race humans are.

There's a difference between a Mayan "Prophecy" that A. has never happened and B. was not a prophecy, and meteors which HAVE happened and are real things. One kinda hit Russia just a few weeks ago. Was a small one, but still.

We're on a planet hurtling through space, in a solar system that is littered with millions of chunks that are also hurtling in space. The idea that some of those chunks can hit us is not farfetched, it's happened many times over the course of this planet's existence.

[Malcor]

I never said that the threat was not real, I know it is. Believe me it's one of my biggest fears. That something big is coming our way and we won't be able to stop it..not at this very moment anyway. I am talking about sensationalist news and one of NASA's own people saying something as odd as "We don't know of any huge asteroids at the moment, But if one comes in three weeks, Pray"

Why would he specify 3 weeks from now like that? It ties into the whole fear mongering idea. You hear NASA saying "Pray..." and you get a chill down your spine.

As Neil deGrasse Tyson said on the other page. The threat was always there, But it took the Russian meteor for people to finally go "Oh shit, Maybe we can be hit by one of those things"

[Stir]

I never said that the threat was not real, I know it is. Believe me it's one of my biggest fears. That something big is coming our way and we won't be able to stop it..not at this very moment anyway. I am talking about sensationalist news and one of NASA's own people saying something as odd as "We don't know of any huge asteroids at the moment, But if one comes in three weeks, Pray"

Why would he specify 3 weeks from now like that? It ties into the whole fear mongering idea. You hear NASA saying "Pray..." and you get a chill down your spine.

As Neil deGrasse Tyson said on the other page. The threat was always there, But it took the Russian meteor for people to finally go "Oh shit, Maybe we can be hit by one of those things"

Basically: the three weeks thing is just a matter of speech. The 'pray' thing just means that we can't do anything about it. deGrasse Tyson just tells us that there's rocks zipping about. That's really all there's too it. I think you're just making too much of it.

[apepi]

Eh, I never take cnn/yahoo news seriously. While this problem needs to be worked on I don't think it is necessarily a real problem right now.

[Rukentuts]

Eh, I never take cnn/yahoo news seriously. While this problem needs to be worked on I don't think it is necessarily a real problem right now.

We don't know if it's a real problem. Only a tiny fraction of possible threats are documented, not to mention no developed solution due to lack of resources.

[Sayl]

I am talking about sensationalist news and one of NASA's own people saying something as odd as "We don't know of any huge asteroids at the moment, But if one comes in three weeks, Pray"

Why would he specify 3 weeks from now like that? It ties into the whole fear mongering idea. You hear NASA saying "Pray..." and you get a chill down your spine.

The NASA Administrator was answering a question posed to him by Rep. Bill Posey (R, FL), who asked about how the agency could respond in the event of a hazardous asteroid being discovered with three weeks before an impact. Bolden's response was his way of trying to get his point across (remember this is in a partisan political environment) that NASA's capabilities in that regard are quite limited because the issue has been put off for decades.

It also demonstrates his frustration with the Republican members of the committee who've both made a habit of unduly grilling him for purely political reasons, and are quite clueless about the operational capabilities of NASA's resources and missions. One committee member asked him if the James Webb Space Telescope could be retrofitted to look for NEAs (Derp! No.). He and other members also had to be reminded that the Space-Based Infrared System of defense satellites (designed to monitor for missile launches) aren't capable of searching for asteroids. (Sigh.) I can only imagine how frustrating Bolden's job must be.

That's not fear mongering, it's typically crappy media coverage which omits context and details. You can't expect to shoehorn adequate coverage of a House Science Committee hearing on near-earth objects and potentially hazardous asteroids into a 450-word article. Most journalists these days aren't up to the task anyway because they're just as clueless about astronomy, space, and science in general.

As Neil deGrasse Tyson said on the other page. The threat was always there, But it took the Russian meteor for people to finally go "Oh shit, Maybe we can be hit by one of those things"

Right. With the fly-by of 2012 DA14, the Chelyabinsk meteor, and the comet C/2013 A1 making a very close approach to Mars next year, these are all wake-up calls that we need a reliable system in place to not only detect but also deal with threats posed by space rocks. They pose a real threat, no matter how mainstream press articles try to take advantage of the situation to generate page views.

[Masark]

that NASA's capabilities in that regard are quite limited because the issue has been put off for decades.

NASA's capabilities for intervening that late are quite limited due to physics. Reality isn't a Micheal Bay film. We wouldn't just be able to send a bunch of oil drillers to split it in half, because 1. we don't have a suitable spacecraft and 2. splitting the rock in a manner that wouldn't just result in the two halves hitting the earth a few feet apart would require more (a lot more) boom than every single nuclear weapon humanity has ever built all combined.

If you're going to interdict an impact, you need to know about it years, preferably decades, in advance. The earlier you start working, the less adjustment needs to happen.

[oblivionx]

It's easy to say that "more funding" would yield NASA being able to shoot down asteroids.

Reality is a little different though.

Fact is they never have and probably can't even with nearly unlimited resources.

The last thread somewhere on this topic I calculated the momentum of the last asteroid that passed us. It's a truly immense number to deal with, especially if you are trying to do it near earth orbit.

In the future we need more advanced warning and need to be able to realistically predict and divert at much greater distances.

Armageddon was a movie. Nothing more.

Just pick any of the asteroids that cross earth orbit of a decent size and look them up and calculate their momentum that would have to be redirected in some way. Or look at their mass and composition and try and figure out how much explosives would be required to break them.

[Sayl]

NASA's capabilities for intervening that late are quite limited due to physics. Reality isn't a Micheal Bay film.

I don't need to be reminded of this. Some impact scenarios might not allow for a response; others would. The real point is that there's only one tested mitigation technique at NASA's disposal, in the form of a repeat of the Deep Impact mission (which launched a kinetic impactor at 9P/Tempel 1). With enough advance warning the hardware could be assembled and deployed if the target object were suitable. Aside from that, there is no ready-to-go system to deal with NEO hazards, and that needs to change. It's been hard enough just to squeeze out the promised funding for detection, and that's still behind schedule.

[Dezerte]

It's easy to say that "more funding" would yield NASA being able to shoot down asteroids.

Reality is a little different though.

Fact is they never have and probably can't even with nearly unlimited resources.

The last thread somewhere on this topic I calculated the momentum of the last asteroid that passed us. It's a truly immense number to deal with, especially if you are trying to do it near earth orbit.

In the future we need more advanced warning and need to be able to realistically predict and divert at much greater distances.

Armageddon was a movie. Nothing more.

Just pick any of the asteroids that cross earth orbit of a decent size and look them up and calculate their momentum that would have to be redirected in some way. Or look at their mass and composition and try and figure out how much explosives would be required to break them.

The current ideas is not to shoot down an incoming asteroid, but land a satellite with a rocket engine attacked to it; to change it's trajectory.

We've already successfully landed a satellite on a asteroid traveling at 25km/s, so this is not really fantasy.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/25143_Itokawa

[Zangeiti]

I love everything NASA does but this is just unnecessary

[oblivionx]

The current ideas is not to shoot down an incoming asteroid, but land a salivate with a rocket engine attacked to it; to change it's trajectory.

We've already successfully landed a satellite on a asteroid traveling at 25km/s, so this is not really fantasy.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/25143_Itokawa

The momentum of the last near asteroid was so large.... you would have to probably do it way further out that we have actually ever gone.

---------- Post added 2013-03-20 at 05:19 PM ----------

DA 14 had a momentum of 520,000,000,000 p. for mathematical reference.

[Rukentuts]

The momentum of the last near asteroid was so large.... you would have to probably do it way further out that we have actually ever gone.

---------- Post added 2013-03-20 at 05:19 PM ----------

DA 14 had a momentum of 520,000,000,000 p. for mathematical reference.

This is exactly why it takes years to alter their course, which is why early detection is necessary.

[oblivionx]

This is exactly why it takes years to alter their course, which is why early detection is necessary.

I just think it's not within our technological ability right now. Regardless of funding of Nasa.

We would have to be able to predict and see them and get to them well before we currently do. Years before we currently can.

[Redmage]

Unfortunately they are not wrong.