Mars Asteroid - The NASA Near-Earth Object Program is reporting that a large asteroid has a 1 in 75 chance of hitting Mars on January 30th, while another asteroid is headed toward Earth in 2029.
A 1-in-75 shot like the predicted Mars asteroid impact is “wildly unusual,” said Steve Chesley, an astronomer with the Near-Earth Object office, which is tasked with tracking roughly 5,000 asteroids and comets wandering about in Earth’s neighborhood.
“We’re used to dealing with odds like one-in-a-million,” Chesley said. “Something with a one-in-a-hundred chance makes us sit up straight in our chairs.”
The large Mars-bound asteroid, designated 2007 WD5, is about 160 feet across, similar to an asteroid that exploded just before impact in Siberia in 1908. That explosion, the largest impact event in recent history, felled 80 million trees over an incredible 830 square miles.
Photo of the Tunguska asteroid impact crater taken in 1908:
Because scientists have never observed an actual asteroid impact (the closest event observed was the 1994 collision of comet Shoemaker-Levy with the planet Jupiter), such a collision like the Mars asteroid would produce a “scientific bonanza,” Chesley said.
The asteroid is now behind the moon, he said, so it will be almost two weeks before observers can plot its course more accurately.
Earthbound Asteroid Due In 2029
NASA’s Near-Earth Object Program at the JPL lab at CalTech is tracking a similar-sized asteroid named “Apophis” that is estimated to have a 2.7% chance of hitting Earth in 2029 and again in 2036.
Mile-wide Meteor Crater in Arizona from 80-foot diameter asteroid impact:
In an asteroid impact research study published in October 2007, the NASA scientists outlined the difficulties in predicting the exact paths of of these wandering asteroids.
Factors such as the spin of the asteroid, its mass, the way it reflects and absorbs sun-light, radiates heat, and the gravitational pull of other asteroids passing nearby can all modify the asteroid’s potential impact probability, especially when these small directional changes are magnified across a path tens of millions of miles long.
In addition, small uncertainties in the masses and positions of the planets and Sun can also cause asteroid impact prediction error.
Because of it’s close proximity to the Sun, the Apophis asteroid will not be visible to telescopes until 2011 or trackable by radar until 2013, so exact predictions are impossible at this point in time.
The asteroid’s close brush with the Earth in 2029 is estimated by NASA to be a once in 800 years event, so the Near-Earth Object Program will be closely studying the behavior of the Mars asteroid in January 2008 to learn all they can about predicting asteroid paths as they encounter strong gravitational forces deep within our solar system.
That’s why the possibility of tracking an impact of the Mars asteroid has the NASA Solar System Defense Team excited.
“Normally, we’re rooting against the asteroid,” when it has Earth in its cross hairs, Chesley said. “This time we’re rooting for the asteroid to hit.”
And that’s the latest news on the January 30th impact of the Mars asteroid and its Earthbound companion due in 2029.
Tags: asteroid, mars, mars asteroid, space
December 21st, 2007 at 12:52 pm
Great! Something else to worry about!
December 21st, 2007 at 1:41 pm
I have every confidence that someone taught intelligent design as “science” will save us…
December 21st, 2007 at 1:57 pm
[...] The large Mars-bound asteroid, designated 2007 WD5, is about 160 feet across, similar to an asteroid that exploded just before impact in Siberia in 1908. That explosion, the largest impact event in recent history, felled 80 million trees over an incredible 830 square miles.[read more] [...]
December 21st, 2007 at 6:56 pm
Sounds like that movie “Armageddon”…
December 26th, 2007 at 8:13 am
I will be 94 in 2029 so probably won’t be around to see it.
It will be great to witness. The radio propagation due to ionization could be interesting.
Best Wishes albert G3ZHE
December 26th, 2007 at 6:38 pm
This will be great! The rovers should be able to supply us with volumes of information, provided the rovers can survive the impact and shockwaves.
December 27th, 2007 at 2:03 am
December 2012… End of Mayan Calendar… In Revelations; “A Mountain will hit the Earth (…)” but no precise date is given. Could the Beast’s several heads cited in Revelations actually represent G8 or yet another conglomeration of countries yet to come?
However, perhaps like every generation before us, we think ours will be the last… Hopefully, just like preceding generations, we will be proven wrong.
Least, from my lips to God’s Ears!
Happy, SAFE and FEARLESS New Year to All
December 27th, 2007 at 2:09 am
Maybe our global existing Scientific Bodies should very seriously start to consider a plausible solution for dealing with such ELEs…
Instead of thinking about blowing these things to bits (bits that will, no doubt, spell catastrophes - tsunamis, et al - when they will fall on Earth) maybe those “in the know” could concentrate their efforts in finding a way to track these things via some kind of gravitational beam in order to slightly alter their orbit.
Maybe Specialists in Magnetism of non-magnetic materials could be called upon to be of most help in determining the kind of electromagnetic forces that should be used in such cases, in order to PULL these things out of their current line of impact?
Hmmm… Something to think about?
December 27th, 2007 at 2:18 am
What are these things made up of, anyway? Ice? Minerals? Salts? Metals?
If Ice: a series of solar/chemical (specifically attacking H20 crystallized bonds) panels could be sent on their way and then deployed on its surface - or nearby - way before these ever even come close enough to Earth to even cause alarm?
If minerals: Which minerals? What kind of chemical bonds hold these together? Attack these weaknesses. Every action has an equal and opposite reaction, right?
If Salts: What crystalization form? What chemical bonds? As above.
If Metals: What kind of chemical bonds hold these together? What kind of electromagnetic forces could influence/sway their orbit?
Not pretending to know anything about anything… Just trying to think creatively here, without panic as an agent.
We’re a pretty smart species. We should come up with something to prevent this from happening (again!)
December 27th, 2007 at 6:42 am
they will probably roll the rover out of the way if they get near the projected impact area…and when all is calm have them check it out.
December 28th, 2007 at 6:15 am
Tilly,
Good you are thinking about these things. Check out the B612 organization!
Here is a report to show you what NASA reported in 2006…
http://www.b612foundation.org/papers/NASA-finalrpt.pdf
Cheers!
Jim
December 28th, 2007 at 6:16 am
http://www.b612foundation.org
December 29th, 2007 at 10:04 am
NASA Ups Odds Of Mars Asteroid Impact To 4%
LOS ANGELES (AP) - The chance of a football field-sized asteroid plowing into Mars next month has been increased to 4 percent, scientists said Friday after analyzing archival data.
The odds were increased to 1-in-25 this week after a Ph.D. student pored through the archives and plotted the asteroid’s motions before its official discovery. The new information allowed scientists to improve their calculations of the asteroid’s orbit and flight path.
Scientists will continue to monitor the asteroid to better predict the possibility of a Martian impact. Yeomans said he expects the odds to decrease with new observations gathered early next year.
The likelihood of an asteroid hit usually “peaks before plummeting to zero with additional data,” he said.
The asteroid poses no threat to Earth and is closing in on the Red Planet at 27,900 mph.
Should a collision occur, it would likely blast a half-mile-wide crater north of where the rover Opportunity has been exploring since 2004.
December 30th, 2007 at 2:00 pm
NUKE IT!!!
December 30th, 2007 at 2:02 pm
NUKE IT!!! Like Armagedon the movie.
December 30th, 2007 at 9:35 pm
is this wormwood
December 31st, 2007 at 3:00 am
So what are the odds the asteroid strikes one of mar’s moons? if it hit the smaller one it would likley put alot of debri in martian orbit and be a hazard to any future landers trying to get through. what do ya’ think?
January 2nd, 2008 at 9:13 pm
So lets think for a minute… when asteroids hit objects such as a planet or other object, don’t they usually send bits of the thing they smashed in lots of different directions? so what if the asteroid hits mars, sends bits of mars flying and then Earth gets showered in it? is that a problem?
and is there going to be any way to avoid an aseroid if it chose to head for your own country? would NASA be able to tell exactly where it would hit and then be able to tell its citizens to flee? oh just another worry for me to add to my life long list (which may be shorter than i had hoped). And i was SO looking forward to a good nite’s sleep!
January 5th, 2008 at 12:46 am
Asteroid schmasteroid, as long as I’m rich.
January 9th, 2008 at 10:16 pm
Mars Asteroid Impact Less Likely
(AP) Scientists tracking an asteroid approaching Mars say that an impact with the Red Planet has become less likely.
Refined estimates of the asteroid’s orbit were made using new observations from a telescope at the Calar Alto Observatory in Spain, according to the Near-Earth Object Program at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory.
The impact probability fell to 2.5 percent, the NEO office said in Jan. 8 update posted on the NEO Web site. The miss distance was holding steady at about 30,000 kilometers, or 18,600 miles.
The asteroid, dubbed 2007 WD5, was discovered in late November by the NASA-funded Catalina Sky Survey in Arizona.
Odds of an impact had risen to about 4 percent by late December and scientists were excited about the possibility of observing a cosmic collision on Jan. 30.
The size of a football field, the asteroid could blast a half-mile-wide crater into the Martian surface.
January 15th, 2008 at 8:58 pm
One of the more troubling aspects of moving an asteroid out of its current trajectory (by landing crafts equipped with thrusters) so that it misses the Earth 20 years from now is: One must be very careful where one moves the asteroid–If relocated improperly, it might hit Earth in 10 years instead of 20. Calculating the trajectories of every possible orbit between the asteroids current location and the location to which it is moved is prohibitively time consuming and expensive. Making matters worse is the fact that we need to calsulate every possible orbital trajectory for the next 100 years (or longer) lest we doom our great grandchildren to misery they would have been spared.