Scientist: Asteroid May Hit Earth in 2029

Yahoo/AP ^ | 12/23/04 | JOHN ANTCZAK

[hole_n_one]

Scientist: Asteroid May Hit Earth in 2029

Thu Dec 23, 5:40 PM ET

By JOHN ANTCZAK, Associated Press Writer

LOS ANGELES - There's a 1-in-300 chance that a recently discovered asteroid, believed to be about 1,300 feet long, could hit Earth in 2029, a NASA (news - web sites) scientist said Thursday, but he added that the perceived risk probably will be eliminated once astronomers get more detail about its orbit.

There have been only a limited number of sightings of Asteroid 2004 MN4, which has been given an initial rating of 2 on the 10-point Torino Impact Hazard Scale used by astronomers to predict asteroid or comet impacts, said Donald Yeomans, manager of the Near Earth Object Program at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena.

No previously observed asteroid has been graded higher than 1.

On Friday, April 13, 2029, "we can't yet rule out an Earth impact," Yeomans said. "But the impact probability, as we call it, is 300-to-1 against an impact."

The asteroid was discovered in June and rediscovered this month.

"This is not a problem for anyone and it shouldn't be a concern to anyone, but whenever we post one of these things and ... somebody gets ahold of it, it just gets crazy," he said.

"In the unlikely event that it did hit, it would be quite serious. We're talking either a tsunami if it hit in the ocean, which would be likely, or significant ground damage," Yeomans said.

Its estimated size has been inferred from its brightness, which assumes that its reflectivity is similar to other asteroids that have been observed. At about 1,320 feet in length, it would have about 1,600 megatons of energy, Yeomans said.

Asteroid 2004 MN4 takes less than a year to go all the way around the sun and on each orbit it passes by Earth's orbit twice, Yeomans said. It is also nearly on the same plane as Earth's orbit.

The asteroid will be visible for the next several months and the NEO program has alerted its network of ground-based observers to include 2004 MN4 in their searches.

Yeomans said there have now been about 40 observations, first from the observatory at Kitt Peak, near Tucson, Ariz., and this month from Australia and New Zealand.

___

On the Net:

Near-Earth Object Program: http://neo.jpl.nasa.gov

[SunkenCiv]

thanks

[SunkenCiv]

thanks

[SunkenCiv]

for laughs...

Former Military Air Traffic Controller Claims Comet Collision with Earth on May 25, 2006
U.S. Newswire (a press release service) via Yahoo | Apr 13 | Dr. Michael Salla
Posted on 04/21/2006 10:54:42 PM EDT by george76
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/1619315/posts?page=243

[SunkenCiv]

It's called Apophis. It's 390m wide. And it could hit Earth in 31 years time [Asteroid]
The Guardian (UK) | December 7, 2005 | by Alok Jha
Posted on 12/06/2005 9:59:40 PM EST by aculeus
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1535383/posts

[SunkenCiv]

Asteroids: Deadly Impact National Geographic

[SunkenCiv]

It has declined to 1 in 23,000 chance.

Asteroid risk to Earth lowered, scientists say
by Alan Boyle
May 18, 2006

After a fresh round of radar observations, astronomers said Thursday that the chances of a catastrophic asteroid impact in the year 2036 are lower than previously thought -- and they're hoping the threat will be completely ruled out once more readings are made. The chances of collision with the asteroid Apophis in 2036 now stand at 1 in 24,000, said Steve Chesley, an expert on near-Earth objects at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory. That's a significant advance from the previous orbital predictions, which set the odds of impact at 1 out of about 6,000... Astronomers estimate its diameter at about 1,300 feet (400 meters) -- which means a collision would spark a regional catastrophe, though not a global extinction event on the scale of the dinosaurs' demise... Apophis is a special case because it spends most of its time within Earth's orbit, making observations difficult... "We were able to improve our understanding of its motion by about 6 millimeters per second," Giorgini.

[freedumb2003]

Asteroid risk to Earth lowered, scientists say

Without the Kyoto Treaty? Mon Deu, how is this possible?

[SunkenCiv]

Here's a clip from a link posted on that more recent Apophis topic a few posts back.

We Must Decide to Do It:
The Saga of Asteroid 2004 MN4
by Rusty Schweickart
The Planetary Society

This article was originally printed in the July/August 2005 issue of The Planetary Report... Another, more subtle result of this situation is that for several years at a time, MN4 and Earth orbit the Sun relatively close to each other, but then for extended periods (6–7 years), the two are far enough apart that regardless of MN4's position with respect to the Sun, it's too far away to see with our telescopes. We are now about a year from beginning one of those extended periods when we will get little new information to further refine the orbit of MN4... Our best information indicates that in the fading twilight on April 13, 2029, Londoners will be able to see MN4 with their naked eyes... What will be invisible to all of us on that evening is the 28-degree turn that MN4 will take as it whizzes past us. MN4 will end up in quite a different orbit on April 14 from what it had on April 12, shifting from an orbit 323 days long to one of about 428 days. Exactly what its new orbital period will be depends on precisely how far behind Earth it passes on April 13... If, by chance, MN4 passes by Earth so that its new orbit has a period of about 426.125 days, the asteroid and Earth will come back to the identical orbital positions in exactly seven years. MN4, however, will have taken precisely six orbits of the Sun to do so, while Earth took seven. In this situation, called a resonance orbit, two bodies orbit the Sun in periods that are exact multiples (with low values) of each other.

This antedates the two most recent refinements to the orbit.

[dfwgator]

"And monkeys may fly out of my butt."

[KoRn]

Guess there's no point in quitting smoking then. Time to go get a few credit cards and some loans.

[kAcknor]

At 92 i'm not going to be concerned!

I'll be 75 and I do believe I'll take notice!!

[AnnaZ]

13

Hmmm... I was born on a Friday the 13th, so I guess Bush is off the hook this time. It's all my fault.

[cmsgop]

[AnnaZ]

YIKES! I was just about to go to bed, and you leave me with that image?!!

[cmsgop]

Put it on your Blog, PAGE ONE, LOL!

[AnnaZ]

I can't do it. He's just too damn ugly. (Egads!)

[cmsgop]

I understand..........

[JCEccles]

The earth has been struck countless times in the past and will get hit again. Somewhere spinning in the deep cold blackness of space is a huge rock that has our number on it I've long found it interesting that Book of Revelation, much maligned by the secular priests of the world, describes a remarkably similar event in our future and was boldly making the prediction long before scientists were willing to accept asteroid impacts as fact. Rev. 8:8 "And something like a great mountain burning with fire was thrown into the sea, and a third of the sea became blood; and a third of the living creatures in the sea died, and a third of the ships were destroyed."

[AnnaZ]

God bless ya!

[samm1148]

Just take a poll--democrats and Bushbots believe what those things say. So if a majority of Americans dont beleive an asteroid will hit the earth, then it wont.

Hell if you dont want the sun to rise tomorrow just take a poll on that too while you are at it.