Better odds of hitting us than me hitting the state lottery...
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That's nearly a one-in-a-million chance.
I think because it will come so close that we will have an excellent opportunity to mess with it so that we will be better prepared for the one that has a 1-in-3 chance down the road.
I think because it will come so close that we will have an excellent opportunity to mess with it so that we will be better prepared for the one that has a 1-in-3 chance down the road.
read this a couple of days ago
ASTEROID 2003 QQ47 was first observed on Aug. 24, and based on limited data, experts at NASAs Jet Propulsion Laboratory estimated as of early Tuesday that there was a tiny chance 1 in 909,000 that the space rock would smash into Earth on March 21, 2014.
Observations gathered on Monday night, however, allowed astronomers to plot the asteroids orbital course more precisely. By Tuesday evening, the risk for 2014 was eliminated. JPL said there was still a 1-in-2.2 million chance that an impact could occur sometime in the next century, but that is far below the background risk of a catastrophic collision in any given year.
We have many asteroids that have residual risks, Paul Chodas, a research scientist at JPL who specializes in calculating the orbits of near-Earth objects. This particular one was of interest because it is fairly large, 1.3 kilometers [0.8 mile], and the predicted impact was only 10 years away. Combining those two factors, we raised it to some level of concern.
The rock was first observed by the Lincoln Near Earth Asteroid Research Program, also known as LINEAR.
At one time, the 2014 encounter was given a rare rating of 1 on the Torino Scale of asteroid and comet threats. But based on the additional observations, the Torino rating was reduced to zero by JPL as well as the NEODyS asteroid-monitoring group in Italy.
We expect the impact possibilities to go to zero, Chodas said. That is the usual scenario.
If a rock as big as 2003 QQ47 ever were to hit Earth, it could have the effect of millions of Hiroshima-scale atom bombs. Such impacts are thought to have contributed to mass extinctions, including the demise of the dinosaurs 65 million years ago.
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ASTEROID 2003 QQ47 was first observed on Aug. 24, and based on limited data, experts at NASAs Jet Propulsion Laboratory estimated as of early Tuesday that there was a tiny chance 1 in 909,000 that the space rock would smash into Earth on March 21, 2014.
Observations gathered on Monday night, however, allowed astronomers to plot the asteroids orbital course more precisely. By Tuesday evening, the risk for 2014 was eliminated. JPL said there was still a 1-in-2.2 million chance that an impact could occur sometime in the next century, but that is far below the background risk of a catastrophic collision in any given year.
We have many asteroids that have residual risks, Paul Chodas, a research scientist at JPL who specializes in calculating the orbits of near-Earth objects. This particular one was of interest because it is fairly large, 1.3 kilometers [0.8 mile], and the predicted impact was only 10 years away. Combining those two factors, we raised it to some level of concern.
The rock was first observed by the Lincoln Near Earth Asteroid Research Program, also known as LINEAR.
At one time, the 2014 encounter was given a rare rating of 1 on the Torino Scale of asteroid and comet threats. But based on the additional observations, the Torino rating was reduced to zero by JPL as well as the NEODyS asteroid-monitoring group in Italy.
We expect the impact possibilities to go to zero, Chodas said. That is the usual scenario.
If a rock as big as 2003 QQ47 ever were to hit Earth, it could have the effect of millions of Hiroshima-scale atom bombs. Such impacts are thought to have contributed to mass extinctions, including the demise of the dinosaurs 65 million years ago.
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Thanks for the info. BEA!
No Problem Webby
Thanks Bea!
Great info!
Great info!
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