Note: this topic is from March 17, 2002.
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Posted on 03/17/2002 2:20:48 PM PST by blam
Asteroid sentry takes up post on web
Nasa has developed an automatic look-out for asteroids which could hit the Earth.
The Sentry system constantly updates the orbits of known asteroids as new information comes in.
Objects which pose any risk are posted on the system's website and withdrawn once it becomes clear they are safe.
Sentry was designed by Nasa's Near-Earth Object Programme over a period of two years.
Objects normally appear on the system's so-called 'risks page' because their orbits can bring them close to the Earth's orbit but it isn't always immediately clear how close.
A spokesman says newly spotted objects can be added at any time.
He added: "Several new 'Near Earth Asteroids' each month may be listed on the Sentry Impact Risks page, only to be removed shortly afterwards.
"This is a normal process, completely expected. The removal of an object from the Impact Risks page does not indicate that the object's risk was evaluated mistakenly: the risk was real until additional observations showed that it was not."
The Sentry system works with the Neodys Clomon impact monitoring system operated in Italy.
Story filed: 14:22 Friday 15th March 2002
They can paint pictures of earth getting splatted by an asteroid, they can make themselves dizzy looking all over for incoming asteroids. All this is ineffectual
There are two things to do that would not be ineffectual. One thing they could do is send an asteroid motor into orbit around the moon so if it is ever needed it can be sent on its intercept trajectory right away. The other thing they could do is start mining asteroids, make things out of them; they seem hazardous now, later they will be seen as a valuable commodity.
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