Asteroid to fly by Earth in November - Visible to naked eye

[Mike70]

Ah, quite right ol' chap! yeah mike, your first post just had the "anyone?" in it without a pic. it instantly made more sense with the pic attached.

[Rancid Carcass]

absolutely, positively the worst idea to the deal with an incoming asteriod. There isn't a worse way to attempt to stop one. Well, perhaps trying to deflect one with the power of the mind...

[AcesandEights]

Well, perhaps trying to deflect one with the power of the mind... I've already done that with Apophis. I call my technique "ignoring the possibility of my impending demise".

[Mike70]

I've already done that with Apophis. I call my technique "ignoring the possibility of my impending demise". quote of the day. on a serious tip: the best way to deflect an asteroid from striking the earth would be to change its velocity slightly. even a change of a few mm per second would mean the difference between a strike and a miss. there are several plausible ways to this: a. using the mass of a couple of spacecraft to tug on the asteroid to change its velocity. b. attaching a couple of craft to the asteroid and using the thrust of their engines to move it slightly. c. if one is detected far enough away from earth, simply painting it a bright color (or using reflectors aimed at the sun) would cause the radiation from the solar wind to reflect off of it and over a long enough period of time that would push it out of an earth crossing orbit. nuclear weapons don't work the same way in space nor do they have nearly the destructive power that they do on earth. why you ask? because a vast amount of the destruction caused by an atomic blast comes from the almost unimaginable overpressurization in the atmosphere and the subsequent shockwave created. in space, without an atmosphere, this cannot occur. that ends the astrophysics portion of our day at HPOTD.

[EvilNed]

A couple scary things: one they said was that this is the closest anything's going to get until 2028. How much freaking closer can you get without messing things up?!?!? The other thing was how close to the moon this thing is supposed to get. Heck, it looks like it's going to be a third closer than the moon at some point. Yikes. And how close would this thing actually have to get before our gravity would swing it around another direction, maybe in our future path? Scary stuff to me, especially to know doom is possibly hurtling at you like that. They'd probably even be able to tell you the exact second it's going to hit. [/I] That graph in the original post only shows two dimensions, whereas actual space is of course in three dimensions. The graph fails to take into consideration the dimension of Z (or height, if you can call it that in space). So just because it appears to be close to the moon when looking down on it from a bird's eye perspective doesn't necessarily mean it is so. As for the gravity, remember that this asteroid is probably on it's path for a reason. That reason is probably the sun, but I can't tell because I'm not all that familiar with this asteroid. But even if it is close to earth, the sun's gravity would probably still hold greater hold of it than earth. To that asteroid, Earth's gravity is but a whispher in the cold, dead sea of emptiness that is our solar system, whereas the Sun's gravity would be a loud shout.

[Neil]

To that asteroid, Earth's gravity is but a whispher in the cold, dead sea of emptiness that is our solar system, whereas the Sun's gravity would be a loud shout. Yes and no... The Sun accounts for basically 99% of the mass of our solar system. But then the asteroid is 93,000,000 miles away from it, and only 200,000 from the Earth. Shall we do the math? It's a straight forward formula?

[EvilNed]

Don't be a smartass, Neil.

[MikePizzoff]

On his resume it states: HPotD owner & resident smartass.

[Mike70]

2005 YU55 is in an orbit around the sun. it would require a perturbation of its orbit by another body (which it would have to pass at just the right time and angle to happen) to change its orbit. since the sun is the focii of its orbit the chances of the earth moving this thing is small. here is a JPL's site. it shows the Z axis and it appears that this asteriod's orbit is inclined. on a side note: if you are an astronomy geek, this site may become addictive to you. http://ssd.jpl.nasa.gov/sbdb.cgi?sstr=2005YU55;orb=1

[Publius]

nuclear weapons don't work the same way in space nor do they have nearly the destructive power that they do on earth. why you ask? because a vast amount of the destruction caused by an atomic blast comes from the almost unimaginable overpressurization in the atmosphere and the subsequent shockwave created. in space, without an atmosphere, this cannot occur. Of course, if you use a nuclear penetrator to detonate the warhead under the asteroid's surface, you can use a large chunk of the asteroid itself as reaction mass to nudge the asteroid into a different orbit. Much better use of nuclear weapons than trying to actually blow the asteroid to pieces. But its effectiveness would depend on the asteroid composition - it should be soft enough to blow a decent crater in it, but solid enough not to shatter completely (which could leave large chunks still aimed at Earth).

[Mike70]

Of course, if you use a nuclear penetrator to detonate the warhead under the asteroid's surface, you can use a large chunk of the asteroid itself as reaction mass to nudge the asteroid into a different orbit. Much better use of nuclear weapons than trying to actually blow the asteroid to pieces. But its effectiveness would depend on the asteroid composition - it should be soft enough to blow a decent crater in it, but solid enough not to shatter completely (which could leave large chunks still aimed at Earth). very true but as you point out, that'd be a dicey proposition. but if there was no time to attempt another manner of deflection...

[Neil]

Oh! Seems you won't be able to see it after all http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-15572634 We have Apophis passing us in 2029 at only a bit more than one earth diameter away! Now that is VERY close! And it WILL be visable! There is, according to the latest calculations, no danger from Apophis either. However, it will pass much closer to the Earth on 13 April 2029 - at a distance of just 29,500km (18,300mi). After the Minor Planet Center confirmed the June discovery of Apophis, an April 13, 2029 close approach was flagged by NASA's automatic Sentry system and NEODyS, a similar automatic program run by the University of Pisa and the University of Valladolid. On that date, it will become as bright as magnitude 3.4[9] (visible to the naked eye from rural as well as darker suburban areas, visible with binoculars from most locations[12]). This close approach will be visible from Europe, Africa, and western Asia. As a result of its close passage, it will move from the Aten to the Apollo class.

[Legion2213]

I watch Stargate, that Apophis fellow is trouble! His shady asteroid is not to be trusted. And 18.000 miles is what I like to call "way too fucking close - back off bitch!"

[AcesandEights]

Oh, well...I saw the simple graphic from the 1st page used on my local news to show the flight path of the asteroid. Of course, no one mentioned Apophis on the news when they started assuring people this asteroid was nowhere close to hitting us

[Neil]

Oh, well...I saw the simple graphic from the 1st page used on my local news to show the flight path of the asteroid. Of course, no one mentioned Apophis on the news when they started assuring people this asteroid was nowhere close to hitting us Apophis will be so close, it would be close enough to knock out geostationary satellites! (However it won't due to the trajectory of its path.)