British scientists are set to go where only Bruce Willis has gone before: chasing after asteroids on a collision course with Earth.
In a three-year ?300,000 (US$529,600) study funded by the UK government-backed Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council, engineers will use computer simulations to work out the feasibility of changing the direction of asteroids.
"It's clear from geological records that the Earth has been impacted in the past by large objects," Colin McInnes of Strathclyde University said. Although none of the space objects currently tracked by NASA are heading for Earth, McInnes added that preparing for a potential catastrophe was a valid concern.
"You have to place it in context -- it's a small risk but with a high consequence," he said.
The project will look at a range of methods proposed by scientists over the years, from giant mirrors floating in space which could vaporize parts of an asteroid to methods that rely more on brute force, such as smashing a rocket into the asteroid to deflect it.
"The deflection methods fall mainly in two categories, kinetic methods and low-thrust methods," Gianmarco Radice of Glasgow University said.
"Kinetic methods are those which provide an instantaneous change of properties within the asteroid.
Sending a nuclear warhead or some sort of exploding device against the asteroid ... to create shock wave, for example. Low-thrust methods range from painting the surface of the asteroid with reflective or absorbing paint so that the properties of the surface are changed by attracting more or less light, thus heating or cooling the surface and changing the physical properties of the asteroid," Radice said.
Whatever method is used, it would only change the path of the asteroid by minute amounts.
"You can make very small adjustments to their orbits to create large changes in their orbits in the future," McInnes said.
The exact methods used would have to vary depending on the type of asteroid being targeted.
TRUMP EFFECT: The win capped one of the most dramatic turnarounds in Canadian political history after the Conservatives had led the Liberals by more than 20 points Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney yesterday pledged to win US President Donald Trump’s trade war after winning Canada’s election and leading his Liberal Party to another term in power. Following a campaign dominated by Trump’s tariffs and annexation threats, Carney promised to chart “a new path forward” in a world “fundamentally changed” by a US that is newly hostile to free trade. “We are over the shock of the American betrayal, but we should never forget the lessons,” said Carney, who led the central banks of Canada and the UK before entering politics earlier this year. “We will win this trade war and
‘BODIES EVERYWHERE’: The incident occurred at a Filipino festival celebrating an anti-colonial leader, with the driver described as a ‘lone suspect’ known to police Canadian police arrested a man on Saturday after a car plowed into a street party in the western Canadian city of Vancouver, killing a number of people. Authorities said the incident happened shortly after 8pm in Vancouver’s Sunset on Fraser neighborhood as members of the Filipino community gathered to celebrate Lapu Lapu Day. The festival, which commemorates a Filipino anti-colonial leader from the 16th century, falls this year on the weekend before Canada’s election. A 30-year-old local man was arrested at the scene, Vancouver police wrote on X. The driver was a “lone suspect” known to police, a police spokesperson told journalists at the
North Korean leader Kim Jong-un has unveiled a new naval destroyer, claiming it as a significant advancement toward his goal of expanding the operational range and preemptive strike capabilities of his nuclear-armed military, state media said yesterday. North Korea’s state-run Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) said Kim attended the launching ceremony for the 5,000-tonne warship on Friday at the western port of Nampo. Kim framed the arms buildup as a response to perceived threats from the US and its allies in Asia, who have been expanding joint military exercises amid rising tensions over the North’s nuclear program. He added that the acquisition
An American man identified as the son of a deputy director of the CIA was killed in eastern Ukraine last year while fighting under contract for the Russian military, an investigation by independent Russian media said. Michael Alexander Gloss, 21, died on April 4 last year in “Eastern Europe,” an obituary published by his family said. He was the son of Juliane Gallina, who was appointed the deputy director for digital innovation at the CIA in February last year. The story of how the son of a top-ranking US spy died fighting for Russian President Vladimir Putin’s full-scale invasion of
RSS