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[smallios74]

Anyone who can watch iplayer episode 3 of stargazing live at about 9 mins in starts talking about Apophis, infact most of this episode is about asteroids etc. They also talk about the asteroid going to pass through geo-stationary orbit on Feb 15th this year.
Looks like the article was written before this episode and before they had fully checked the data, in this case article is incorrect no need to send Bruce and the boys this time.

 

[friskykillface]

0_o jeez that's close and lol they didn't know how big it was.


There's only one solution for 2029, if it will take out satellites then just clog our atmosphere with tons of satellites to block the astroid B^)

16 years huh, so I'll be 40 when it might hit, Hmmmmm

 

[zyxwvu4321]

Gizmodo is shit. They pump up the bigger size, but ignore the change of impact chance.

I'll believe the real astronomer here that there is a 0% chance of 2036 impact. Not 1/1,000,000, zero.

When the new data were added to what was already known about its orbit, it was found the asteroid will definitely miss the keyhole in 2029, and thus miss us in 2036. By a large margin, actually: more than 20 million kilometers (14 million miles), or 50 times the distance to the Moon.

 

[kswiston]

But, and I remember this quote from Batman Begins, "When a forest grows too wild a purging fire is inevitable and natural". So while I am putting a human and moral spin on why the universe chucked an asteroid at us, statistically speaking, we have been due for an asteroid collision for a while now. The last extinction level one was about 65 million years ago and in that regard, Apophis doesn't look to bring about an end of that sort.

The meteor that killed the dinosaurs impacted with a force that was over 100 000 times greater than the force that this meteor would hit with. Also, even the K-T meteor didn't wipe out life on earth. A lot of animals survived through the ecological chaos, which is why we still have turtles and alligators, and mammals today. Hell, even some of the dinosaurs survived, since birds are really dinosaurs.

I think with our adaptability the human race would survive an extinction even sized meteor strike. We have people living for extended periods of time in Antarctica and space. People also live in the hottest deserts on earth. We're clearly more adaptable than any other mammal on the planet. A large portion of the worlds population would likely die, and conditions would be horrible all around, but I think there would be someone left when climates started to settle again.

 

[FLAguy954]

I don't understand, why not destroy it?

 

[Randolph Freelander]

I for one look forward to the impact.

 

[RyanDG]

On a more serious note, wasn't it suppose to come back in 13 years after that. That is when it was suppose to come seriously close to hit Earth... 2036 wasn't scary date the 13 years afterwards was suppose to be.

Pretty sure its the 2036 date that was the scary one, because there was a lot of concern that in 2029, the asteroid could potentially fall into the Earth's "keyhole" that will essentially shift the asteroids orbit with enough influence that it will be sent basically on a stellar superhighway straight back at us in 2036. Hadn't hear of the pass in 2049, but was pretty sure all of the worry was the 2029 pass creating that superhighway effect for the 2036 pass.

 

[EVOL 100%]

I don't understand, why not destroy it?

Easier said than done.

If it actually became a real threat I'm sure we'd actually pool our resources together to do something about it, but apparently the chance of that happening is.. zero.

Gizmodo is shit. They pump up the bigger size, but ignore the change of impact chance.

I'll believe the real astronomer here that there is a 0% chance of 2036 impact. Not 1/1,000,000, zero.

 

[RoyalFool]

If it is going to hit us, couldn't they just strap some nukes onto it? and re-direct onto Florida

 

[Derrick01]

I'm moving to Australia or Greenland.

Oh sure move to Australia to dodge the asteroid only to die from 20 foot tall tarantulas.

 

[Al-ibn Kermit]

If it is going to hit us, couldn't they just strap some nukes onto it? and re-direct onto Florida

Well they'd have to relocate the NASA facilities first. Plus you'd castrate America.

 

[Remmy2112]

I don't understand, why not destroy it?

Like someone else said it is easier said than done. Contrary to popular fiction nuking it isn't the only way to be sure. We'd need to know what it is made of and I'm not sure if our ballistics technology is up to par. We have missiles that can go into low orbit and come back down on the planet, but I do not believe we are quite to the point where we have something that could travel into space, or be fired from space itself, and accurately hit something traveling as fast as Apophis, even with its size.

We would also likely need more than one, and it would require some pretty complex calculations to figure out where and when to hit it so that it doesn't split up into chucks that could still hit us.

 

[Arment]

Like someone else said it is easier said than done. Contrary to popular fiction nuking it isn't the only way to be sure. We'd need to know what it is made of and I'm not sure if our ballistics technology is up to par. We have missiles that can go into low orbit and come back down on the planet, but I do not believe we are quite to the point where we have something that could travel into space, or be fired from space itself, and accurately hit something traveling as fast as Apophis, even with its size.

We would also likely need more than one, and it would require some pretty complex calculations to figure out where and when to hit it so that it doesn't split up into chucks that could still hit us.

We'd hit it if the missile was manned.

 

[Mariolee]

So in 16 years that thing will look pretty amazing on the sky won't it?

Sounds like the plot of Melancholia.

 

[layzie1989]

Gizmodo is shit. They pump up the bigger size, but ignore the change of impact chance.

I'll believe the real astronomer here that there is a 0% chance of 2036 impact. Not 1/1,000,000, zero.

Okay, this is good then. I'll be sure to relay this message to all of my friends i've freaked out over this over the years

 

[TheKaeptain]

On a more serious note, wasn't it suppose to come back in 13 years after that. That is when it was suppose to come seriously close to hit Earth... 2036 wasn't scary date the 13 years afterwards was suppose to be.

Yeah I remember them saying it would hit the Pacific then and we would have to evict a small part of the coast.