Thoughts on the Middle East, History and Religion
Posted on 02/15/2013 by Juan Cole
Russia Today compiles amateur videos of the meteorite that struck Chelyabinsk, Russia, (900 miles east of Moscow) wounding hundreds, mainly because of flying glass.
Here is what happens if a really big meteor hits:
I think we need our space program back.
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There is always the possibility that larger meteorites hit the Earth. Are the governments doing everything they could to develop the technology to detect and destroy these meteorites before they hit the ground?
Just a bit of pedantry – only once it has hit the ground is such an object called a ‘meteorite’. While it is traveling through the atmosphere, it’s (and its tail are) known as a meteor, and previous to that a meteoroid. Though I’ve been hearing increasing calls for development of tech to combat such things, I don’t know of any government that has yet taken it up. There seem to be a few plausible methods bandied about, which is quite exciting, when you think about it. Never before has our species had the ability to deal with such a threat. It would be a shame if bickering or bureaucracy got in the way.
Wrong
SpacePrograms
Morph into weapons programs
Let’s right the social challenges while
Stoppimg War!
[you are usually pointedly correct]
I remember that the word meteor is used for those that do NOT hit the earth-meteorites are those that do.
What I find interesting is that the Chair of the House Committee on Science, Space, and Technology (Lamar Smith – R – TX) has made a knee-jerk announcement today declaring we should have hearings on near-Earth asteroids, as if they are something just discovered today. This is the same Lamar Smith who has called climate Change scientists “alarmists.” I suppose maybe he’ll want hearings on that once we’re all underwater.
There’s no profit in just letting natural occurrences destroy private property. At least the private property of anyone that matters.
But if it’s a man-made occurrence, that means men are getting paid to cause destruction, and they will pay to shield themselves from the law so they can continue.
It could have been so big that it caused the launching of nuclear weapons perhaps?
No, that’s now it works..
well, I saw this National Geographic documentary, “Armageddon,” and it looks like NASA and the military have this under control (with Bruce Willis’ leadership.)
“detect and destroy”
Might it not be easier and cost-effective to simply divert them into safer orbits? If you “blow up” a big rock, a fair quantity of its fragments can be expected to continue on the same general trajectory into the earth.
Frankly, we’re lucky this didn’t happen during the nuke-happy 1950s or 1960s. It might have triggered an all-out nuclear exchange between US and USSR. As it was, I suspect there was substantial communication on the “red telephone” yesterday morning between Mr. Putin & Mr. Obama.
More On the Trigger-Happy Cold War Days…
Remember how we now all laugh at “duck & cover”? As in, when you see the flash, duck and cover”? How futile! How crazy! How pointless! is the general assessment these days.
But. Most of the flying glass injuries, which resulted in hospitalizations and even deaths, came when people saw the flash – and ran to the windows for a closer look.
What about the slow moving meteorite called climate change and ecosystem destruction. let’s develop weapons against that
A related story was the coincidence of a 150-foot asteroid that missed Earth by only 17,000 miles.
It had been detected initially only about one year ago by ameatur astonomers in Spain. If it had impacted with Earth, the explosion would be the equivalent of 2.5 million tons of TNT.