Asteroid hits earth in 2012 / "2012 da14" - msm news report (video)

Originally posted by Tresker
Some day I hope someone places a solorpowered HD camera on a asteroid to film its journey.

I've alway thought the same thing. To find on that makes close passes to other bodies in the solar system and even earth and place multiple HD cameras and other scientific equipment. Why build space craft when we have intersolar system transportaion already functioning. It would also be cool to place time capsules on asteroids tha have returning orbits and leave things for future generations to find.

reply to post by usmc0311


Wow!

Imagine how bad it would be if the thing actually made impact!

Originally posted by cavalryscout
reply to post by usmc0311

 

Wow!

Imagine how bad it would be if the thing actually made impact!

I'm not sure which would be worse, an impact or an explosion in the air. I want to say an air burst is worst but I could be wrong. I'm going to dig around and see what I can find.

Originally posted by Unity_99


Again 150 feet is small.

Compared to a pebble its big.

10-100 meters

10--100 m: Objects in this size range can produce devastation similar
to that of an atomic blast (leading to them occasionally being called
"city-busters"). Effects include severe damage to or collapse of
standing buildings and the ignition of flammable materials leading to
widespread fires. The radius over which such effects occur would vary
depending upon the size and composition of the object, but could
easily exceed 10 km.
www.faqs.org...

I wouldn`t want this landing anywhere here.

Also this looks like a handy site for those that want to put in all the particulars...
impact.ese.ic.ac.uk...

Originally posted by berkeleygal
reply to post by cavalryscout

 

I actually saw that broadcast. When he said that about thinking about getting your affairs in order, I said out loud (to the cats LOL) Did you hear what he just said? I thought it a strange thing to say, even if he was just joking..

Not directed at you specifically, but IMHO only debilitatingly distrustful conspiracy theorists would read into such a lame attempt at humor from a stuffy newscaster to mean anything remotely nefarious.

Sometimes I just shake my head. Not everything is a conspiracy, you loons!

So if it's going to be even closer to impact in 2020, shouldn't they send something up to it and knock it off its orbit or just flat out destroy it? If it might hit us in the future, I'd feel better about them taking care of the problem now than waiting another 7 years to see what its doing.

Maybe they all experienced the Phoenix lights a while back, and havent been the same since?
I hear a lot of people woke up from that one....
This asteroid coule be maybe directed in some other path by explosive of some kind no?
I mean how fast is it going?
Couldnt we get a ship up there to shoot some kind of rocket at it which would alter its trajectory?
is this out in the Van Allen belt ?Im not sure but think it may be.....
Surely we could hit it with something we already have in stock?

reply to post by cavalryscout


interesting


for all those out there........plug it into this sim
Impact Earth sim

Originally posted by MisterFister103
So if it's going to be even closer to impact in 2020, shouldn't they send something up to it and knock it off its orbit or just flat out destroy it? If it might hit us in the future, I'd feel better about them taking care of the problem now than waiting another 7 years to see what its doing.

Better yet let those google guys mine it for its resources I'm sure changing the mass as much as that would could make it harmless then we all could go to war over the rights to this rock.

Originally posted by ColAngus

Originally posted by berkeleygal
reply to post by cavalryscout

 

I actually saw that broadcast. When he said that about thinking about getting your affairs in order, I said out loud (to the cats LOL) Did you hear what he just said? I thought it a strange thing to say, even if he was just joking..

Not directed at you specifically, but IMHO only debilitatingly distrustful conspiracy theorists would read into such a lame attempt at humor from a stuffy newscaster to mean anything remotely nefarious.

Sometimes I just shake my head. Not everything is a conspiracy, you loons!

Indeed, you can do the calculations for yourself and see that it won't hit us on that pass. I did (pardon my crappy mic):

Now, years into the future there's a very slight chance, but there are a number of asteroids that pose a more serious threat than this one. The odds of this ever impacting are right in line with most other PHA's you've never heard of. Right now we have bigger threats to think about like 2011 AG5 (which is still a long shot but much less of one). The only thing that makes 2012 DA14 newsworthy is how close the February pass could be, but the jokes about an impact are just that, jokes.

I was wondering what size Tsunami a thing of this size could generate if it did ever happen to enter earths orbit and impact in one of the oceans?

They will just mine it as it passes by...

Well actually 150ft can do a heck of a lot of damage just take a look at the Barringer Crater, Arizona, US... Exactly the same size; it's what it's made of and the speed it's travelling that makes the difference.

en.wikipedia.org...

I wouldn't like to imagine the size of the tsunsmi if that impacted the ocean!

reply to post by lioninthenorth


I don't know, a tsunsmi from that in the right place would be nasty, but personally I would be more concerned about if this thing did an air burst over a populated area. The air blast from that I would think would be beyond huge.

Originally posted by Chance321
I don't know, a tsunsmi from that in the right place would be nasty, but personally I would be more concerned about if this thing did an air burst over a populated area. The air blast from that I would think would be beyond huge.

It might be "huge" in relative terms, but if the blast were at sufficient altitude, it wouldn't pose a threat.

The altitude at which asteroids air burst, will depend on many factors, if it air bursts at all. One factor is the material these objects are made from, which in many cases can be surprisingly weak, so lots of "quite large" objects don't make it far into our atmosphere since they air burst, like this one, caught on camera over South Africa in 2009.



US DOD/AF satellites often detect such asteroid events, and measure the energy released, which can easily equal the energy released when a small nuke detonates, but at high altitude it's of very little consequence.

Either way, it's much more likely to just "graze" our atmosphere, probably not anywhere near close enough (about 100 km) to become visible to the naked eye.

It also won't be much of a threat to satellites - although there are lots, the distance between them is huge (usually 100s to 1000s of km), and a small 150 foot asteroid is much more likely to slip right through all the empty space between them. There is much more danger to satellites during strong meteor showers believe it or not, since lots of meteoroids means a greater chance of one/some hitting a satellite, and even a small one can be very damaging.

This year's Leonid meteor shower will be so big it poses a threat to the thousands of satellites orbiting Earth. At least one satellite could be shorted out when the Earth passes through the dusty trail of the comet Tempel-Tuttle, astronomers predict.

Leonids may short satellites

Better make sure I put my car in the garage. I don't want asteroid dust all over it..

Maybe Google executives will save the planet, you know, go up there and mine the asteroid to death.