More on the same lines.
We’re going to launch a fridge at an asteroid to see if we can move it. Apparently Maguire does have some potential after all.
We’d see a big one years out. Ish….
I have absolute faith that when confronted with a massive threat to human existence on this planet, everyone and every nation, will pull together and coordinate an effective response.
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True to form I suspect that a select few will construct even more fridges into which they will hibernate deep underground until it is safe to venture out again.
Then again I suspect that 99% of the football league would be more than happy to launch Maguire at an asteroid to see if they can move it. Majority rules right?
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He’d arrive late and the meteorite would shimmy past him with ease
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Has anyone thought of Dimorphos in this?
Asteroids have rights and feelings too don’t they?
Has anybody thought about if it all goes pear shaped and we somehow manage to transfer it to a new orbit that ends up on a collision course with us?
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Crossed my mind but I suspect they’ve picked an object where the chance is pretty much zero. The size of the universe continues to astound me. We are smaller than even a spec.
really tempted to start some astrophotography this Winter. I was going to say for a laugh but being out in the cold for hours on end in the dark doesn’t sound overly amusing somehow. I also conscious that it can be a stupid expensive hobby and I dont want to get dragged down that rabbit hole too far.
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The smart move would be to send up Nat to head it away.
Probably, but they’re fiddling around with the moon of an asteroid that is 780m across. If they get it wrong and manage to cause a collision between the moon and the big daddy asteroid then its anybody’s guess what orbit its going to go into. Couldn’t they have picked another one?
The Boring company should develop a massive table tennis bat that sits beneath the ocean so that if an asteroid enters Earth’s atmosphere it rises out of the depths and swats it away.
No imagination or ambition these people.
I guess so. Plenty to choose from. I’ve no idea why they picked that one in the first place but I suspect that it’s because of its orbit to Didymos. It’s locked and a little bump will only change that orbit slightly and we would be able to see the results quickly. From the article.
However, if Dart were to slam into a lone asteroid, its orbital period around the Sun would change by about 0.000006%, which would take many years to measure.
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Pffft, I’d develop a massive robotic arm for the moon that would actually catch the asteroid if I wasn’t so busy.
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That would be ace. A huge baseball mitt.
Think of the branding opportunities.
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Come on guys. BOOOOORRRRRRRIIIIIIIIIINNG
We need this
No need to launch Nat into space for that.
Just position him on the highest point near the predicted impact area and he’ll send it on its way, by head or by foot, should (on the high chance) Slabhead miss it.
Watching this at the moment. Great stuff.
Music’s a bit ott, but otherwise brilliant.
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It’s amazing. But Mrs Mascot hasn’t quite recovered from the fact that black holes suggest that space and time are emergent properties of a deeper reality we can’t grasp, rather than the basic structure of the universe. It properly messed her up.
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