Asteroid With Chance of Hitting Earth in 2029 Now Being Watched 'Very Carefully' (1 in 43 odds)

http://www.space.com ^ | Update, Dec. 25, 9:47 p.m. ET | Robert Roy Britt

[Andrew LB]

I think its doing around 15 km/sec. Thats moving pretty quick.

[doug from upland]

I was really hoping it would hit here in about 2006 --- 41:09:34N 73:45:55W

[shadowman99]

"I am glad it will not cause destruction of global scale. However, if it did hit Earth, it would most likely fall into the ocean and create tsunami of biblical proportion."

I was just thinking about that. Is there any way to know for certain that's not exactly what happened earlier today?

Any geologists here to take a stab at that?

[rommy]

Definitely an incredible work of science fiction. A favorite of mine from an early age :)

[BenLurkin]

Not to mention the Browns and the Superbowl . . .

[BenLurkin]

Ping.

[thoughtomator]

I guess since the global warming thing has been pretty thoroughly debunked, the catastrophists need a new living.

[eclectic]

We all gonna die!

[Caipirabob]

I'm holding off on joining Netflix. If the world ends and there are days left in the month, I ain't losin out!

My wife just old me the same thing for cookies and ice cream. Or could it be that she wants me to lose weight? Nah, I know it's the asteroid...

[Darkwolf377]

"My wife just old me the same thing for cookies and ice cream. Or could it be that she wants me to lose weight? Nah, I know it's the asteroid..."

She's hoping if you slim down you won't be such a good target for the asteroid. That woman's a saint! :)

[Redcloak]

And it's a Friday the 13th too!

[rwfromkansas]

1 in 43 is still a big yawner.

Give me 1 in 10 and it will be time to sit up.

[Joe Hadenuf]

Why do they treat us like babies? We can take 9/11 We can handle Falluja We can deal with this too.

You're kidding right? A 400 meter diameter asteroid impact would make those events seem trivial by any destructive standards.

[rwfromkansas]

ick.....47 here.

Man, time flies.

[rwfromkansas]

you are kidding me....lol.

[Robert_Paulson2]

book of revelation.

a star called "wormwood" crashes into the earth in the end times and kills one third of life on the planet.

if clarke used it in one of his stories, he probably got it from there...

nothing new under the sun.

[Freedom4US]

I will periodically bump this thread for the next twenty-four years.

[tortoise]

These odds estimates are based on a Monte Carlo probabilities, where several variables are each part of the matrix.

Its a little more complicated than that, but roughly true. They have not been able to nail down some of the parameters that would allow them to get at some extremely precise orbital elements. They'll be hovering around 1:43 until they get some better sensors looking at it; right now, that represents the margin of error for the models based on a lack of important parameters e.g. the rotational period and axis relative to the sun. It isn't as though they can't produce exceedingly precise orbital predictions but that they do not trust some of the data they have so far. Some of the unofficial analyses on the same data that tries to adjust for dubious data or bad calibration and giving missing parametric data "statistically representative" values is putting impact probability at closer to 1:20. But we still need better data, which will require the asteroid to be visible in the northern hemisphere to a significant extent, something which will happen in a bit. Right now, the rock is hovering around the South Pole.

[tortoise]

Wonder what the uncertainty is on size....1/4 mile diameter, +/- 1/4 mile?

Most folks are currently giving the diameter to be a quarter-mile +/- a factor of 3 i.e. it could be 3/4 of a mile in diameter (a country killer there). The photometric calibrations have been completely hosed, leading to data that is pretty uncertain for the size calculation. Once they sort this out with a ton of high-quality measurements, I get the impression that the feeling is that this rock could actually be a bit larger than currently estimated. We'll know soon enough, but the current margin of error on the size is huge and the people examining the calibration of the current data seem to think that they may have underestimated the size. A lot of the data currently being collected is pretty amateur because the asteroid is so deep in the southern hemisphere.

A >1km diameter asteroid would be substantially more catastrophic than the current size estimate suggests.

[lwoodham]

I have been thinking about this. I agree that Monte Carlo analysis is surely being done on this. That means they know minimum(0 in case of a strike) and maximum distances of passage based on 1 in 43 odds. I have been trying to figure out if the maximum passage distance includes the moon within the possible strike cone. I realize that much more data will be required to know where the moon will be in orbit at that point in time. The rock hitting the moon would not probably cause any appreciable orbit change since the moon's mass is much greater, but would provide some incredible chances for science and the greatest light show of all time.