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2025-02-12 -Signs, Portents, and the Weather-

Scientists warn of possible collision of asteroid 2024 YR4 with the Moon

Direct Translation via Google Translate. Edited.
[Regnum] New calculations have shown that the asteroid 2024 YR4 , which is potentially threatening the Earth, may not reach the planet and crash into the Moon. This is the conclusion reached by a group of asteroid hunters from the University of Arizona and NASA, the British publication The Independent reported on February 11.

Earlier, NASA's Center for Near-Earth Object Studies (Cneos) estimated the probability of this asteroid colliding with the planet in 2032 at 2.3% instead of the previous 1%. At the same time, astronomer David Rankin, an engineer with the Catalina Sky Survey, estimates the probability of its collision with the Moon at about 0.3%.

"There is a possibility that it could eject some material that could fall to Earth, but I highly doubt it would pose a serious threat," the publication quoted Rankin as saying.

If a large asteroid collides with the Moon, which has no atmosphere, a crater hundreds of meters wide could form on its surface. Debris from it would be thrown into space, the article says.

As reported by the Regnum news agency, the asteroid with the designation 2024 YR4 was discovered in December by specialists from the ATLAS observatory in Chile. Its diameter is presumably between 40 and 90 m, which roughly corresponds to the Tunguska meteorite.

This object topped the list of asteroid risks of NASA and the European Space Agency (ESA). The probability of the Earth colliding with all other celestial bodies included in this list does not exceed 1%, while for this one the figure varies from 0.5 to 6%.

According to Stanislav Korotky, scientific director of the Ka-Dar observatory and the Astroverty astrofarm, the range of estimates of the threat of YR4 colliding with Earth is due to the short period of observations of this cosmic body. So far, the supposed area of the object's fall is considered to be Central Africa or the Atlantic Ocean.

In China, YR4 has prompted the formation of a planetary defense team.

Posted by badanov 2025-02-12 00:00|| || Front Page|| [11165 views ] Top

#1 SMOD has entered the chat.

Posted by Rex Mundi 2025-02-12 02:01|| 2025-02-12 02:01|| Front Page Top

#2

OK, the 1st thing that popped into my mind was.
Did I miss a new Hollywood Disaster Movie up for release?

But now, somewhere I am sure, given this 6-year window.
There are sudden Self-Made Experts and Doomsayer Pimps already scripting, planning and rehearsing their overhyped narratives of an Asteroid Moon impact inducing a Climate Change.

All of which will grease the way, so that the DC Talking Heads and UN can waste $$$ Billions claiming to take steps to prevent it.

Any bets, around year 4, they just happen to update the claim so that the impact area will be on the Dark Side of the Moon?

Posted by NN2N1 2025-02-12 07:31|| 2025-02-12 07:31|| Front Page Top

#3 "There is a possibility that it could eject some material that could fall to Earth, but I highly doubt it would pose a serious threat," the publication quoted Rankin as saying.

I am going to use that line in my next movie. It is called "Postcard from Tunguska".

Posted by SteveS 2025-02-12 08:57|| 2025-02-12 08:57|| Front Page Top

#4 Splitting of the Moon

Posted by Skidmark 2025-02-12 11:02|| 2025-02-12 11:02|| Front Page Top

#5 SMOD has entered the chat

Posted by DarthVader 2025-02-12 11:59|| 2025-02-12 11:59|| Front Page Top

#6 Scientist gives chilling update on the 'city-destroying' asteroid heading towards Earth - and warns NASA has left it too late to deflect it

Posted by Skidmark 2025-02-12 12:33|| 2025-02-12 12:33|| Front Page Top

#7 by 2032 we should have adequate technology to take care of this in the very unlikely case that the asteroid actually is on a collision course

Posted by Lord Garth 2025-02-12 19:39|| 2025-02-12 19:39|| Front Page Top

#8 There are two parts to the problem of stopping or deflecting an asteroid. The first is getting there. SpaceX has solved that part and unlike NASA, they will not need 2 years lead time to schedule a launch.

The second part is what to do when you get there. Sometimes asteroids are big chunks of busted-up planet, but more often they are just flying piles of gravel and rocks. A big chunk can be deflected by pushing on it. Pushing a gravel pile just spreads it out. No doubt clever solutions exist, but the time to start thinking about them is now.

Posted by SteveS 2025-02-12 20:25|| 2025-02-12 20:25|| Front Page Top

#9 Yes, SteveS, but a bunch of gravel will break into its constituent pieces when it hits the atmosphere, resulting in mostly meteorites that will burn up before they reach the ground — impossible to deflect but mostly not a risk to life at the bottom of the gravity well, and even the larger chunks are less of a threat than Daily Mail hysterics are going on about.

Posted by trailing wife 2025-02-12 20:59|| 2025-02-12 20:59|| Front Page Top

#10 I am not so sure about the physics of that, tw. I think the answer is "It depends".

When a meteor enters the atmosphere at high speed, friction with the air quickly heats the surface above the vaporization point of rock and makes that pretty streak of light in the sky. A small chunk will burn up in the atmosphere. A big chunk will continue to ablate until it hits the ground and vaporizes explosively, leaving a characteristic round crater, like Barringer Crater in Arizona.

The pile of gravel scenario is more like a dust explosion in a flour mill. You have lots of little bits with a whole lot of surface area compared to a chunk. Air friction being a surface phenomena, the little bits all vaporize at once and you get an air burst like the Chelyabinsk event in Russia in 2013 where the blast wave caused a lot of property damage.

If you could break up the gravel pile far enough from Earth so it did not enter the atmosphere all at once, I would expect it to behave as you describe.

The Tunguska meteor in 1908 was another airburst that make a big mess without ever hitting the ground.

Posted by SteveS 2025-02-12 22:43|| 2025-02-12 22:43|| Front Page Top

#11 Pttttttthhhhhp! You’re better at the physics stuff than I, SteveS. Bummer. I was enjoying not worrying about even the tiny probability of likelihood.

Posted by trailing wife 2025-02-12 23:44|| 2025-02-12 23:44|| Front Page Top

#12 Disaster! Vast, swole up on 'roids,
Are our tabloids just fit for da boids?
Could DM's hysterics
Not be ink-stained clerics
Or mass-manufacturing Freuds? ;-)

Posted by Elmaiter Thinegum9610 2025-02-12 23:58|| 2025-02-12 23:58|| Front Page Top

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