[Prev][Next][Index][Thread]

Re: (meteorobs) Those Meteor Movies - a review



Kevin wrote:
>There was one scientist on either the Learning Channel or the Discovery
>Channel when they were doing documentries to tie in with the two movies.
>Anyway, he said that we will have as much warning as the dinosaurs did.  How
>many times have we all read in Sky & Tel that an asteroid came withing the
>Earth-Moon orbit and we didn't even notice it until it was already 
>outbound. I
>guess we could start a grass roots movement within all the amateur
>obseervatories world wide to have a focus group within to look for these
>things.But we don't have the technology to do anything about it anyway, we
>can't blow them up (a popular solution), we don't have the solar sails that
>have been talked about, so the best thing to do is not even worry about it

Just a final note from me: 

What about the plan to *deflect* an incoming asteroid by detonating nukes
from a distance. Not too close to shatter the thing and make it
worse. By destroying the asteroid, you send a rain of debris on earth, 
with just as much damage.  I read somewhere that a series of carefully 
planned detonations away from the asteroid would send successive 
shock-waves just strong enough to nudge the orbit. But for this to work, 
a very long early warning would be required for a proper preparation.
One thing is for sure: none of the suggested scenarios would call on 
astronauts to go up to intercept. 

                                .    .    . .
Pierre Martin                  . . *  . *  .  .
***************************** . . . \   | .  .
Ottawa Valley Observers Group  .  .    .  .   . .
Visual meteor observer          .    . . .  -* .
Ottawa, Ontario, CAN              . .   . .  .
home:  p.martin@cyberusdot ca           /  . .  . .
*****************************       *  .   .  .
Graphic Designer                     .  |    .
National Aviation Museum                |   \
work:  pmartin@nmstcdot ca                 *  . \
*****************************                 \
                                               *