Two asteroids to pass close to Earth on Wednesday

[Gerald]

Two small asteroids in unrelated orbits will pass within the moon's distance of the Earth on Wednesday, according to NASA.

It's an unusual event that shows the need for closer monitoring of near space for Earth-threatening encounters, a scientist with the program said.

The objects don't pose a threat to Earth, and they will not be visible to the naked eye, said Donald Yeomans, manager of NASA’s Near Earth Program, which tracks potentially hazardous asteroids and comets within 28 million miles of Earth.

The objects will visible from Earth as tiny specks of light with the help of moderate-sized amateur telescopes, he said.

http://news.blogs.cnn.com/2010/09/07...-on-wednesday/


Note:September 7th, 2010

[SteamWake]

Someday one of these 'small' asteroids arent going to miss and there isnt a damn thing they can do about it.

[kranz]

Originally Posted by SteamWake

Someday one of these 'small' asteroids arent going to miss and there isnt a damn thing they can do about it.

don't you know that Armageddon was based on a real story?

[Bilge_Rat]

yes, only a matter of time, lots of rocks out there.

The extinction of Dinosaurs was, according to one theory, caused by an asteroid strike which changed the earth's climate.

and let's not forget the 1908 Tunguska impact when a 20 meter asteroid struck a siberian forest incinerating tress in a 9 mile radius and knocking them down in a 25 mile radius.

[Oberon]

That's pretty damn close.

[Jimbuna]

A bit too close for comfort....where's Bruce Willis these days?

[Dowly]

I see potential in this thread... Yubba, any theories what this could've been?

[TLAM Strike]

Originally Posted by SteamWake

Someday one of these 'small' asteroids arent going to miss and there isnt a damn thing they can do about it.

There are many things we can do about it! The primary one is to locate and chart them all before they hit so we can redirect them.

Redirecting them is easy and can be done with current technology.

The easy way requires a some time before impact (like years) just send a spacecraft up and have it fly next to the asteroid. The gravitational field of the spacecraft tugs at the asteroid slowly pulling it off course.

The harder way is to put a Mylar solar sail on the asteroid and have the solar wind push it out of the way. Downside is that it only works well close to the sun.

The easy and quick way is to turn the asteroid in to a big unmanned Orion drive ship. Send up a bunch of nuclear bombs and detonate them one at a time every minute or so near the surface using the force of each explosion to push the asteroid. With sufficiently big bombs a decent sized rock could be redirected in the space of days or weeks.

[Gerald]

Originally Posted by TLAM Strike

There are many things we can do about it! The primary one is to locate and chart them all before they hit so we can redirect them.

Redirecting them is easy and can be done with current technology.

The easy way requires a some time before impact (like years) just send a spacecraft up and have it fly next to the asteroid. The gravitational field of the spacecraft tugs at the asteroid slowly pulling it off course.

The harder way is to put a Mylar solar sail on the asteroid and have the solar wind push it out of the way. Downside is that it only works well close to the sun.

The easy and quick way is to turn the asteroid in to a big unmanned Orion drive ship. Send up a bunch of nuclear bombs and detonate them one at a time every minute or so near the surface using the force of each explosion to push the asteroid. With sufficiently big bombs a decent sized rock could be redirected in the space of days or weeks.

assuming it is in clear view of course,

[TLAM Strike]

Originally Posted by Vendor

Have you been out and looked at the sky, assuming it is in clear view of course,

Every night its clear.

Last Monday the Pleiades's looked very nice in my binoculars.

But for hunting Asteroids well there ain't no stealth in space.

This deals with combat but its applicable to searching for any hard to find target...

A full spherical sky search is 41,000 square degrees. A wide angle lens will cover about 100 square degrees (a typical SLR personal camera is about 1 square degree); you'll want overlap, so call it 480 exposures for a full sky search, with each exposure taking about 350 megapixels.
Estimated exposure time is about 30 seconds per 100 square degrees of sky looking for a magnitude 12 object (which is roughly what the drive I spec'd out earlier would be). So, 480 / 2 is 240 minutes, or about 4 HOURS for a complete sky survey. This will require signal processing of about 150 gigapizels per two hours, and take a terabyte of storage per sweep.
That sounds like a lot, but...
Assuming 1280x1024 resolution, playing an MMO at 60 frames per second...78,643,200 = 78 megapixels per second. Multiply by 14400 seconds for 4 hours, and you're in the realm of 1 terapixel per sky sweep Now, digital image comparison is in some ways harder, some ways easier than a 3-D gaming environment. We'll say it's about 8x as difficult - that means playing World of Warcraft on a gaming system for four hours is about comparable to 75 gigapixels of full sky search. So not quite current hardware, but probably a computer generation (2 years) away. Making it radiation hardened to work in space, and built to government procurement specs, maybe 8-10 years away.
I can buy terabyte hard drive arrays now.

BTW Magnitude 12 = the brightness of a moon or largeish asteroid...

[Gerald]

Originally Posted by TLAM Strike

Every night its clear.

Last Monday the Pleiades's looked very nice in my binoculars.

But for hunting Asteroids well there ain't no stealth in space.

This deals with combat but its applicable to searching for any hard to find target...



BTW Magnitude 12 = the brightness of a moon or largeish asteroid...

btw,nice site
what do you think of SETI, it is an opportunity