About the size of an asteroid that could cause our extinction and how NASA will protect us

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As the US space agency “NASA” prepares to launch the “Double Asteroid Redirection Test” mission, [“اختبار إعادة توجيه كويكب مزدوج”، أو “دارت” Dart المكونة من الأحرف الأولى لاسم المهمة double asteroid redirection test] On Monday, Sherry Weber-Bayer, an assistant professor of space studies at the University of North Dakota, reflects on the dangers of this first-of-its-kind mission to test technology tasked with deflecting dangerous asteroids.

Bayer refers to the relatively mysterious event called “tektite” that occurred in Australia, and is linked to the collision of a comet or asteroid about 790,000 years ago in Southeast Asia, “and it caused the burning of a large part of Southeast Asia, which led to the elimination of 10 in 100 or more human ancestors were alive at that time.

In a statement to The Independent, Dr. Weber-Beyer stated, “This is why the dart mission is so important. The impact of a small meteorite or comet nucleus is the only potentially avoidable natural disaster that could threaten human civilization or the lives of a large part of the species.” human”.

On Monday evening, NASA’s Dart spacecraft will deliberately collide with a small asteroid 6.8 million miles from Earth in an attempt to change the asteroid’s orbit, in the process of training about the possibility of diverting the path of any space rocks that would endanger Earth in the future. The asteroid impact that Dart is targeting does not threaten Earth.

What asteroids pose a potential danger?

But the potential threat posed by asteroids or other comets remains real, even if it is relatively rare, and the results range from major collisions that can wipe out most life on Earth, to accidents that are hardly a direct hit to the planet to a large extent, but disrupt human civilization. In any case.

According to Dr. Weber Beyer, “It’s not just a blow to Earth. We have a lot of stuff out there in the space around Earth, and those things are easy targets. When a small asteroid flies close to Earth, it can disrupt a lot of our planet’s space infrastructure without necessarily affecting it.” in Earth”.

In general, many asteroids do not pose a threat to Earth, as large numbers of them are located in orbits that will never intersect with our planet, while others are so small that they may burn up in the Earth’s atmosphere without any damage. More than 48 tons of space rocks enter the Earth’s atmosphere annually, some the size of footballs, others the size of sand grains, according to NASA.

But about 2,259 known asteroids are included in the “potentially hazardous astroids” category. [“بي أتش أي”] PHA, according to Dr. Weber Beyer, is classified according to its closest position to Earth’s orbit, as well as its size. If a space rock is about 460 feet (140 meters) in diameter or larger, and its orbit is located approximately 46 million miles (740,29824 kilometers) from Earth’s orbit, or about 19.5 times the distance from Earth to the Moon, it poses a potential danger.

Based on the mentioned calculations, about 7.7 percent of the known objects that are stationed near the Earth are of the type of “potentially dangerous asteroids”.

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How dangerous are asteroids?

It’s easy to see why these “potentially hazardous asteroids” status conditions were set, not least by size criteria. When an asteroid with a diameter of approximately 460 feet, 140 meters, travels at a speed of 44,000 miles per hour, it is in an ideal position to deliver a strike that releases energy equal to 170 million tons of explosive “TNT”, according to an explanation from Dr. Pfeffer Bayer, or “about Three times the energy emitted by the largest hydrogen bomb ever detonated on the surface of the Earth.” It was called the “Soviet Tsar Bomb,” and had a power of 50 megatons of TNT.

Even small space rocks are dangerous, based on how well they hold together as they enter Earth’s atmosphere.

Dr. Weber Beyer notes that in 2013 a small meteor exploded at an altitude of about 97,000 feet over Russia’s Chelyabinsk Oblast, causing a shock wave that shattered windows and damaged buildings. That meteorite was about 20 meters, or 66 feet in diameter, and “emitted energy equivalent to about 400 to 500 kilotons of TNT,” she says.

As a reminder, the nuclear bomb dropped by the United States on the Japanese city of Hiroshima generated an energy equivalent to 15 kilotons of TNT, so if the Chelyabinsk meteorite had stayed intact for longer and exploded close to Earth, according to Dr. Weber Beyer, “Almost a million people would have been affected by this air blast alone.”

How worried should we be about asteroids?

At a press conference on Thursday about the DART mission, Lindley Johnson, NASA’s planetary defense officer, told reporters, “Fortunately, large asteroid strikes remain relatively rare. We are trying to divert it from its path.”

Dr. Johnson explained that the main thing that is perhaps more important than the development of techniques such as “DART” to divert the path of asteroids, is the keenness to monitor all these objects. Therefore, NASA intends to launch a new satellite by 2026, the “Near-Earth Object Observation Space Telescope”. [اختصاراً “نيو”] NEO, to assist in this particular step.

Johnson also told reporters that the NEO Space Telescope will find a group of asteroids 140 meters or larger in about 10 years. It’s a very short period of geological time, so I’m not worried about an impact in that frame. time, unless we’re not at all lucky.”

In fact, the mentioned time frame gives enough time for NASA to carefully study the results of the DART mission and ascertain whether a more upgraded version of the DART spacecraft, or some other technology, can be used to eliminate a major threat to an asteroid or comet. If any of them appear on the horizon of space.

According to Dr. Johnson, the US space agency “will not resort to creating a permanent fleet of (DART) spacecraft. This technology will likely develop. In 30 or 40 years from now, imagine the technology that we will have to deflect an asteroid?” .

In fact, there is no doubt that technology has come a long way in the 20 years that Dr. Weber-Byer has been studying asteroids.

The doctor concluded her speech by returning to “Dart”, explaining that when she set out to “study asteroids, they were [المركبة الفضائية “دارت”] An unattainable dream. We’re on our first technology test, and it’s really amazing. We’ll see if these ideas pay off.”

It remains that the US Space Agency Television will broadcast the NASA “DART” test live, starting at 6 pm EST on Monday evening.

Posted in The Independent on September 27, 2022

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