Explosions in the sky February 16, 2013
Posted by WorldbyStorm in Science.trackback
Ironically, or perhaps not, this came out the day before the Russia meteorite came down…
There was this line in it which I think was useful:
(Only a full-scale nuclear war with Russia might approach the damage of a large asteroid, and that’s not what the billions spent on radiation scanners at container ports, and similar measures, are meant to avert.)
And if that intrigues you you may find this of interest….
I’ve got to admit that the footage of the meteor as it descended is fairly chilling to me, particularly in the shots where it is moving in the general direction of the cameras (by the way, for an explanation as to why there was so much excellent footage consider this).
The big problem is that broadly speaking of all the potential extinction level threats we face this is one of the very few we can actually do something about with contemporary, or practically foreseeable, technology. Tellingly it was only in the 1980s that the threat actually was recognised. But to date the response is a patchwork quilt of essentially ad-hoc organisations (and a nod from the US government) with no clear international effort to combine both the surveillance aspect – which remains partial, and the means to fend off such threats – which remains as of now non-existent.
Indeed the situation has hardly moved on since this was written back in the early days of this blog.
Though this from the Guardian was a bit entertaining yesterday.
Footage of the meteorite was seen streaking across the sky above Russia’s Chelyabinsk region. WARNING: this video contains strong language in Russian. Source: YouTube Link to video: Meteor shards hit Russia after explosion in the sky
Thanks Guardian.
Hm … with all due respect (which is what people always say when they are about to dis you
) it’s a matter of probabilities.
The last extinction event (a) occured in the Cretaceous and Paleogene, and (probably) saw off the dinosaurs and allowed mammals to evolve a branch of big-brained bipedal apes.
Who are now organising their own extintion event (b) by ending the current iceage by a massive introduction of green-house gases.
The probability of an (a) is very very small. The probability (b) that the average surface temperature of the globe will rise by 4 degrees is approaching 1.0. This will (very probably) constitute an extinction event (especially for the poorest) by reducing the available agricultural land by 50%.
Nasa is doing a good job modelling (b) despite all the pressure of the denialist lobby, but I’m less convinced of the value of a real-life game of asteroids (remember those magical tables in bars?)
Even though it appeals to all my atavistic former space-opera-reading instincts.
I’m 100% in the global warming camp but I hope it’s not an issue of do one and ignore the other. Given the limitations of a single planetary biosphere shouldn’t we do all we can to protect it from both
There’s also the issue that the probability of an impact leading to an extinction event isn’t zero, and that it could occur tomorrow, or next week or next year. And of course, there are many levels below extinction event which could cause desperate problems on a global level.
We apes (me included) are very bad at estimating risk and probability and behaving rationally as a result.
Me too.
Actually, as with climate change, isn’t there an argument that we can’t behave rationally even when offered essentially definitive proof of something?
I have to say I found the coverage of what happened in the Urals fascinating, however.
You’d have thought they could give us a guide to the strong language in Russian rather than just warning us about it. As it stands it’s such a tease.