NASA held a teleconference on Wednesday to mark the release of a multiagency report on how the U.S. government plans to deal with asteroids that could strike Earth. Although not all potentially threatening near-Earth objects have been found, NASA, the U.S. Air Force, and the National Science Foundation plan to invest in new telescopes capable of detecting more:
NASA is not going to be able to find all the asteroids big enough to cause serious devastation on Earth by 2020—or even 2033. Also: For a hypothetical attempt to send a spacecraft to divert an seriously dangerous incoming asteroid, we'll need a ten year heads-up to build it and get it to the asteroid.
The good news? They're working on it. "If a real threat does arise, we are prepared to pull together the information about what options might work and provide that information to decision-makers," Lindley Johnson, NASA's Planetary Defense Officer, told reporters.
The meat of the announcement today from was the conversion of a 2016 strategy document (pdf) produced by the Obama administration into a set of coordinated goals (pdf) across the government, from the Federal Emergency Management Agency to the Department of Energy. Sensible stuff— figuring out how better to track asteroids; predict their behavior; re-route or break them apart; and work better with international partners to routinely improve the world's ability to do this.
[...] NASA, under orders from Congress, is focused on finding asteroids bigger than 140 meters across—that is, those that are large enough to devastate an entire region. We still have a lot to do in that regard, per Johnson, who says that “we’ve found about 8,000 near-Earth asteroids at least 140 meters across, but two thirds of such objects remain to be discovered.”
[...] The amount of funds available for Planetary Protection is increasing, with the Trump administration requesting $150 million from lawmakers next year, mostly to fund a mission to demonstrate a spacecraft called DART that could deflect an Earth-bound asteroid. But strangely, Johnson would not discuss specific technologies for hunting asteroids during the media briefing on the report.
(Score: 1) by anubi on Friday June 22 2018, @12:41PM (1 child)
I was wondering if it would appear stationary in the star field as observed from earth, which isn't quite the same as a geostationary orbit.
You caught me... I misdescribed what I was questioning. You are quite right that I described a geostationary object, which isn't quite what I meant.
I was thinking more down the line of a black spot appearing in the star field, and not appearing to move within it.
"Prove all things; hold fast that which is good." [KJV: I Thessalonians 5:21]
(Score: 2) by PiMuNu on Friday June 22 2018, @12:46PM
I think, as the earth is an accelerating frame of reference, the object would move about 1 degree per day relative to the star field? I would need to draw a diagram. Or better still write a script.