Doomsday? That would be April 13, 2036. Maybe. A £150 MILLION space mission should be launched to deflect an asteroid which is set to pass dangerously close to Earth, experts warned yesterday.
The call for action to protect the world from Apophis - named after the Egyptian god of destruction - came from a coalition of astronauts, engineers and scientists with close links to
Scientists have estimated the asteroid has a one-in-45,000 chance of striking Earth on
OK guys, that’s only $293,095,235.61, not a lot of bucks considering real estate values in, say,
In order for the gravitational tractor to work effectively, Lu said, international authorities would have to decide to use it long before an anticipated impact.
"You want many years or even decades of notice," he said. "It's like billiards—when you make a slight change before the bank shot, it creates a big change [in where the ball goes]."
[…]
Schweickart, the former astronaut, thinks the United Nations needs to draft a treaty detailing standardized international measures that will be carried out in response to any asteroid threat.
His group, the Association of Space Explorers, has started building a team of scientists, risk specialists, and policymakers to draft such a treaty, which will be submitted to the UN for consideration in 2009.
The UN? We’re gonna let the UN take care of this? We’re f!cked…
(graphic: Nat Geo)
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