Meet The Tiny Bomb-Wielding Spacecraft That Could Someday Save Our Species

"Scientists have given some thought as to how we'll
defend ourselves when a giant asteroid inevitably
heads our way and solutions range from paintballs
to nukes. A team at Iowa State University has settled
on the latter, and they've got plans for ship to do it
waiting in the wings."

See:

http://gizmodo.com/5961485/meet-the-...ve-our-species

On Nov 17, 5:40*pm, wrote:
"Scientists have given some thought as to how we'll
defend ourselves when a giant asteroid inevitably
heads our way and solutions range from paintballs
to nukes. A team at Iowa State University has settled
on the latter, and they've got plans for ship to do it
waiting in the wings."

See:

http://gizmodo.com/5961485/meet-the-...spacecraft-tha...

blowing up asteroids is a bad idea creating much more debris over a
wider area, doing more damage than a single impact

On Saturday, November 17, 2012 4:20:18 PM UTC-8, bob haller wrote:
On Nov 17, 5:40*pm, wrote:

"Scientists have given some thought as to how we'll

defend ourselves when a giant asteroid inevitably

heads our way and solutions range from paintballs

to nukes. A team at Iowa State University has settled

on the latter, and they've got plans for ship to do it

waiting in the wings."



See:



http://gizmodo.com/5961485/meet-the-...spacecraft-tha....



blowing up asteroids is a bad idea creating much more debris over a

wider area, doing more damage than a single impact

If the bits are small enough, won't they burn up in the atmosphere?

On Nov 17, 7:41*pm, wrote:
On Saturday, November 17, 2012 4:20:18 PM UTC-8, bob haller wrote:
On Nov 17, 5:40*pm, wrote:

"Scientists have given some thought as to how we'll

defend ourselves when a giant asteroid inevitably

heads our way and solutions range from paintballs

to nukes. A team at Iowa State University has settled

on the latter, and they've got plans for ship to do it

waiting in the wings."

See:

http://gizmodo.com/5961485/meet-the-...spacecraft-tha....

blowing up asteroids is a bad idea creating much more debris over a

wider area, doing more damage than a single impact

If the bits are small enough, won't they burn up in the atmosphere?

that would require near vaporizing the asteroid, unlikely to be
successful

In message
wrote:

On Saturday, November 17, 2012 4:20:18 PM UTC-8, bob haller wrote:

blowing up asteroids is a bad idea creating much more debris over a
wider area, doing more damage than a single impact

If the bits are small enough, won't they burn up in the atmosphere?

You still get much the same energy release even if they do so you'll
land up with a super-heated atmosphere instead of holes in the ground.

Anthony

Anthony Frost wrote:
wrote:
bob haller wrote:

blowing up asteroids is a bad idea creating much more debris over a
wider area, doing more damage than a single impact

If the bits are small enough, won't they burn up in the atmosphere?

You still get much the same energy release even if they do so you'll
land up with a super-heated atmosphere instead of holes in the ground.

So the degree of dispursion matters *a lot*. Spread the bits across
300% of the atmosphere and the impact is a lot less. Only spread it
over 50% of the atmosphere and all the energy hits the Earth but it gets
spread over half of the planet. Only spread if over a few KM and it all
comes down as a hammer.

wrote in message
...


If the bits are small enough, won't they burn up in the atmosphere?



That's not necessarily a better solution since depending on the amount of
debris you're converting the kinetic energy of the asteroid into thermal
energy which heats up the atmosphere and the ground below.

That said, diversion is generally preferred.

--
Greg D. Moore http://greenmountainsoftware.wordpress.com/
CEO QuiCR: Quick, Crowdsourced Responses. http://www.quicr.net