Skyfall, or, Was Chicken Little Really Crazy?

There have been a lot of articles written here on ATS and elswhere considering the possibility of a "space rock" impacting Earth. Many people feel that the chances are remote, and that nothing could be done about it in any case. But all may not be as it seems.

Here is an article that raises questions about the "official" odds of an impact, which gives a lot of food for thought. The first link is a short three pages, a mere 15 minutes, that is well worth the time invested:

www.theatlantic.com...

After reading and reflecting on this, there is little doubt that there is some concern in the scientific community. Is this a "clear and present danger"? There are risks to ignoring any known danger, but when the odds change, we are wise to review the data to better understand what needs to be done.

While no one is saying that a "planet buster" is on the horizon, it would seem that chance of a major desaster from an impact may be right around the proverbial corner, perhaps within the next couple or three generations, which is a lot greater than most of us had considered.

For those wanting more information and opinion, I have the following:

www.impact.arc.nasa.gov...

www.sandia.gov...

www.planetary.org...

Just a bit more reading material for those inclined to know more; like maps and effects from computer simulations:

www.lpl.arizona.edu...

www.boulder.swri.edu...

www.meteorite.org...

And last, is there a past land strike crater near you?

geology.com...

I look forward to the comments from those interested in discussing just what our chances really are of seeing such an event as an impact in the next few years. And what efforts need to be made in overall science, and on a personal involvement level, to avert such a catastrophe as an impact would cause.




[edit on 25-5-2008 by NGC2736]

I thought I would bump this, as I posted it during the American Memorial Day holiday, and perhaps it escaped notice.

I realize this isn't as sensational as some items here on ATS, but it does seem noteworthy, at least to me. The increased odds of an impact at least on the order of the 1908 event at Tunguski could have very serious ramafications. The world populations have greatly increased since 1908, so what was a "minor" event then could easily be a catostrophic event now.

Dammit thats a great read.


My Great Grandfather used to captivate the family with his 'I saw Tunguska' UFO over russia tales. Died age 103, and had all his marbles intact to the end.

I love space, and yet it poses so many hazards to our continuation as a species i think its madness not to get off world and out into the stars.

Here is a pic i haave stashed away of the actual area that was right under the air blast.

Hope you like it. Oh and he swore blind that it moved through the air like it did change directions, not once but twice.

WOW great great thread you started here, I am still reading the first page of the first article but I had to stop and comment...I seriously can't believe, that the "great minds" on this planet forgot to calculate objects impacting the oceans when even a 3rd grader knows the Earth is 70% water??? GOOD GAWD lol. Ok I was scared when I read that the odds are way higher, but that these "scientists" forgot to add impacts into the ocean in the original wave of calculations is even scarier!!!!

Ok, going back to the article...

Starred and flagged by the way and will send the link to some friends, very very interesting!

reply to post by Dan Tanna


How interesting to have first hand accounts of something like this. How close was he to the impact/detonation area?

Do you have any details about the "course change"? I've heard tales that there were people who reported directional changes inconsistant with a meteor, but would be interested in how he described these.

reply to post by LateApexer313


Yes, it does boggle the mind that a Phd seems to have no effect on common sense.

From reading here one would gather that our fearless scientists ignored some data. The question one would naturally ask is why? Was it just a brain hiccup for the whole scientific community, or was there some pressure to keep ordinary folks from worrying about something there was no defense against?

All I can say is wow, thanks for alerting us to this article, that was so interesting on so many levels...

I never even knew that asteroids, comets, or just space objects could detonate BEFORE they struck the Earth....thereby not even leaving a crater.

And the whole inside look into the NASA meeting she attended and the response to her question, well that was just aggravatingly priceless, and so typical...

And yes NGC, obviously a PhD doesn't mean the person who earned it has much or any common sense, obviously! Yet I myself forget that all the time and tend to form my opinions differently if there's a PhD weighing in on the issue, silly me! A lesson well learned, once again.

Absolutely mind-boggling, every facet of that article and well worth the read all!!!

He desribed it as such
' it passed straight over head towards the horizon, but then moved like a swimming snake across the sky, first left a little, then sharply right, then it passed over the horizon and a few heart beats later a light so bright and hot it made my clothes feel like a barbers wrap (a hot towel across the face) Then the claps of thunder peeled across us like a roaring monster '

i know later that week he had to cull sick animals from the heards, and they died with a sickness and with massive boils and weeping sores all over their hides (made the hides very brittle and weak). He always maintained that it was red in colour trailing debris and it was early in the morning with a beautiful clear sky. There was also a tall rolling cloud reaching up high into the sky, and as he always said 'just like that cloud that raced skywards over the Japs'.

The object came from the west and fell in a northerly direction.

reply to post by Dan Tanna


Holy moly, that's unbelievable, I can't even imagine witnessing something like that back then or even now!! What a great description your Grandfather gave of it, I could picture it perfectly.

That's so amazing about the livestock too, did your Grandfather himself get any blisters or boils or burns or have any sort of sickness since he felt the heat and the blasts from the shock waves??

Thanks for posting that awesome photo too, wow, it's so cool to see something like that photo and hear about that event from a first hand witness!! Thanks so much for sharing! I guess I should say a first hand witnesses' relative though, but you understand what I meant!

[edit on 1-6-2008 by LateApexer313]

No problem at all.

My Grandfathers father suffered nothing more than a 'bad sun burn' as he put it across his right side of his face and forearm.

Many people actually went to see the impact site and many died with 'puss filled blisters, sallow faces and a long slow lingering malaise'. The animals in the area were destroyed over the following week due to illnesses and their hides just sloughing off them.

from the Atlantic article:

This winter, I asked William Ailor, an asteroid specialist at The Aerospace Corporation, a think tank for the Air Force, what he thought the risk was. Ailor’s answer: a one-in-10 chance per century of a dangerous space-object strike.

I dunno this struck me as a little suspicious, yet I would like to think that we could develop the technology to protect the Earth from impacts without turning it on each other. I'll never get to sleep now.

reply to post by Dan Tanna


Thank you for the retelling of your grandfather's expierience. it does sound much like a bomb, though the reports I know of now show no increased levels of radiation in the area, as would be expected with a nuclear explosion. Perhaps something simular yet with a much shorter halflife?

And living to 103 shows he had no long term effects from this, at least in the ways we are used to them after WWII.

reply to post by LateApexer313


You're welcome. I may not start as many threads as I once did, but I try to share those items that seem important to me. An increased likelyhood of being due for another such event, maybe within our own lifetimes, is a scary thought.

Imagine what the result of such a strike would be were it to happen tomorrow over the UK, with it's rather excessive per square mile population. Or perhaps the eastern seaboard of the US. The devestation would be enormous.

Edit to add: A sea impact/air detonation might also be a major problem due to weather disruption and seawater incursion. Even if the seawater were just to later fall as a briney rain, the damage to crops might be costly in every sense.




[edit on 2-6-2008 by NGC2736]

reply to post by stikkinikki


Politically speaking, about the only viable way for any defense to be workable would be for a majority of nations to cooperate and oversee each other. This would keep down suspecions of such defensive "weapons" being turned on the nations of earth.

But it would be a hard sell at any rate. Yet, it seems to me that the effort would be worthwhile.

I have been thinking about the first article in this thread off and on all day at work, doing a slow burn while the other half of my brain was going about mundane work details....I am sure you know the feeling

It really chaps my backside to know that NASA proposed how much the task of doing a further study and determining exactly how many objects were out there, the threat risk etc...to Congress and they then proceeded to swat it down like a mosquito, as if it were nothing, not worth the cash, no "gain" in their eyes, etc.

They are kidding themselves I guess, or just simply thinking, "Well there's nothing we can do about it, so why bother looking into it?"

That's really scary about the mass extinction of, what did the article say? 2/3's or 3/4's of all ocean life on that one strike? I guess we'll never see it coming!

That is amazing to think as you said NGC, about something like this happening over a populated area, if that Tunguska strike had happened over a major city in Europe or like you said the Eastern seaboard, well it's mind-bending. I hope we never have to find out what exactly WOULD happen.

I am surprised this thread isn't getting more play, considering the topic and the seriousness of the issue.

reply to post by LateApexer313


Yes, it is sad that more people aren't paying attention here. But in some ways, it reminds me of pre-9/11, when there wre signs and even warnings, yet no one it seems bothered to pay attention. I find myself muttering the words "dereliction of duty" sometimes.

If such an event were to unexpectedly happen next week, the politicians would swear they had no idea such a thing could occur. Yet, it's part of their job to seek out and protect average citizens, as best they can, from dangers. And the danger has been shown to them already.

Are our world leaders this stupid? So consumed by tunnel vision that this gets next to no play? I hate to sound paranoid, but it almost seems as if there is a purposeful blind eye being turned towards this. We can waste $$$$M on a bridge to nowhere, or a war to no effect, but we can't take a good hard look at this?

It boggles the mind on so many levels.



[edit on 2-6-2008 by NGC2736]

Some of the biological consequences of the Tunguska event are most significant. In the epicentre there has been an accelerated growth of biomass that has endured for decades after the blast. Several biological mutations have also been recorded, not only within the epicentre itself, but also along the trajectory path of the fire-ball of light as it passed over Tunguska. Abnormalities in the Rh blood factor of the local Tungus people, the Evenks. There is also evidence suggesting genetic variations in certain local ant species, as well as genetic abnormalities in the seeds and needle clusters of at least one of the indigenous pine tree species. (11) Interestingly, other studies have revealed overmagnetized soils in several locations in and around the Tunguska site, and furthermore overmagnetized boulders have been found in the north of the Boguchanski district which is located along the presumed trajectory of the Tunguska body. (13) In some cases the intensity of the magnetization was recorded as anywhere between 10 to 100 times higher than normal levels.

11. Roy A. Gallant. Tunguska: The Cosmic Mystery of the Century. www.usm.maine.edu...

12. G.P. Galantsev. Atmospheric Electricity of the Tunguska Meteorite(TM) The 1998 Krasnoyarsk Conference on the 1908 Tunguska Event.

13. E.N. Lind. New Methods of search for Overmagnetized Rock in the area of Tunguska Catastrophe. The 1998 Krasnoyarsk Conference on the 1908 Tunguska Event.


www.spiritualgenome.com...

There are many documented changes to flauna and fauna in the area, and more importantly to the insect life as well.

What ever happend that day was certainly an event that will take a long long time to fade from peoples wondering curious minds.

reply to post by Dan Tanna


I am surprised that that event is so far off the radar screen, with all of that evidence of mutated plants, over-magnetized soil and rock, obviously it's being studied, but, since it's off the radar, I for one always forget about it, and forget to search and see what new information is out there about it....reminds me of Chernobyl in a sense.

Indeed, a strange landscape of highly magnetic anomalies, yet strangely low radiation counts...

Could it be some type of highly magnetic core to a drive system for their craft ? or a highly dense highly magnetised space debris ?

I love it, its one of the best memories i have of childhood listening to the families stories of 'before the czar fell'.

Dan, thank you for those links. I had not found them myself, and they add very interesting detail. We really have no idea what such an impact/detonation event might entail. Aside from the speculation that it might be an ET craft, not to be totally ruled out by any means, even an exo-rock might harbor a lot of things that could have some long term effects that it seems the scientific community as a whole wants to ignore.

L. A. 313, I for one have come to think, not sure yet, that it's "off the radar" because whatever results might be exposed are more than our leaders, in a lot of nations, want to publicly confront.

And I certainly hope to engage a wider audience in this discussion, as I have seen a lot of "views" shown for this thread, but it seems that only we few are interested enough to post. I would have thought that the possibility of an event of equal magnitude to the WWII bombing of Nagisaki would have interested more people. Especially considering that due to our worldwide membership, at least some of them can expect to be at "ground zero" should such a thing come to pass.

I want to thank the posters of this thread, though few in number, for their cognizance of something that could be of worldwide importance. If the quake in Chine was an event, imagine what an impact from even a small "space rock" could be. So far, participation in this thread has been limited; I hope that isn't an indication of fatalism, something I consider to be unworthy of the human species.