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Earth Space NASA

Newly Discovered Asteroid Has a '1 In 560 Chance' of Hitting Earth In 2046 67

Posted by BeauHD from the mark-your-calendar dept.
A newly discovered asteroid roughly the size of an Olympic swimming pool has a "small chance" of colliding with Earth in 23 years, with a potential impact on Valentine's Day in 2046, according to NASA's Planetary Defense Coordination Office. From a report: The asteroid has a 1 in 625 chance of striking Earth, based on data projections from the European Space Agency, though NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory's Sentry system calculated the odds closer to 1 in 560. The latter tracks potential collisions with celestial objects. But the space rock -- named 2023 DW -- is the only object on NASA's risk list that ranks 1 out of 10 on the Torino Impact Hazard Scale, a metric for categorizing the projected risk of an object colliding with Earth. All other objects rank at 0 on the Torino scale.

NASA officials have warned that the odds of impact could be dramatically altered as more observations of 2023 DW are collected and additional analysis is performed. It may be a few days before new data can be collected because of the asteroid's proximity to the moon [...]. The last full moon was two days ago, and it still appears bright and large in the sky, likely obscuring 2023 DW from immediate observation.

The asteroid measures about 160 feet (about 50 meters) in diameter, according to NASA data. As 2023 DW orbits the sun, it has 10 predicted close approaches to Earth, with the nearest landing on February 14, 2046, and nine others between 2047 and 2054. The closest the asteroid is expected to travel to Earth is about 1.1 million miles (1.8 million kilometers), NASA's Eyes on Asteroids website notes. The space rock was first spotted in our skies on February 2. It's traveling about 15.5 miles per second (25 kilometers per second) at a distance of more than 11 million miles (18 million kilometers) from Earth, completing one loop around the sun every 271 days.
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Newly Discovered Asteroid Has a '1 In 560 Chance' of Hitting Earth In 2046 More

Newly Discovered Asteroid Has a '1 In 560 Chance' of Hitting Earth In 2046

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  • So what? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by backslashdot ( 95548 ) on Friday March 10, 2023 @02:08AM (#63357863)

    That's far less odds than us annihilating each other before it hits.

    • It's 50 meters wide, far smaller than the Tunguska impact that killed zero people.

      If it hits Earth (unlikely) it will break up in the atmosphere, most likely over the ocean. If it hits near a population center (very unlikely), some people will die, but most far less than other natural disasters like hurricanes or earthquakes.

      This isn't something worth worrying about.

      • It's 50 meters wide, far smaller than the Tunguska impact that killed zero people.

        Well, that's disappointing.

      • Re:So what? (Score:5, Informative)

        by RockDoctor ( 15477 ) on Friday March 10, 2023 @07:25AM (#63358201) Journal

        It's 50 meters wide, far smaller than the Tunguska impact that killed zero people.

        We don't know the size of the Tunguska impactor. We have an approximate value for it's energy yield on impact, but that is dominated by the objects closing velocity with Earth (the "v-squared" part of "half m * v-squared"), not by the mass (or volume, or density) of the impactor.

        Also, we don't know how many people were killed by the Tunguska impactor. We know of nobody whose death was attributed to the event, but we don't have any reports from closer to "ground zero" than a few hundred km, and it was about 17 years until any expeditions approached "ground zero". It is assumed that the number of casualties was zero ; it is very unlikely that the body count was more than a handful, but that's an assumption, not a confidently-known fact.

        If it hits Earth (unlikely) it will break up in the atmosphere,

        Maybe, maybe not. We don't know the proportion of small airbursts (smaller than a modest nuke) because we don't have a good mechanism for detecting them. Our global monitoring systems were designed to detect "trinity" type nukes, not smaller explosions, which are probably considerably more common (it's about a power-law distribution, halve your detection limit and you're probably going to about square the number of detections). There's a good chance that it'll break up in the atmosphere, but from a planning point of view you can't exclude the possibility of it impacting in one lump. (You do have experience in carrying out risk assessments of your industrial operations harming passers-by off the site, don't you?)

        most likely over the ocean

        Agreed. About a 65% probability, with your definition of "nearshore" versus "far offshore" mattering.

        It's a small risk of harm on the ground, but not zero. Certainly not worth building a fallout shelter for (I'm doing down a former employer by saying that - they still sell fallout shelter equipment).

        • We don't know the size of the Tunguska impactor.

          Bill pulled that out of his ass.

          Must've been painful.

          • Being reminded of the pain of releasing it onto the world might encourage him to apply his braincell before pressing the "Submit" button.

            One lives in hope.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by necro81 ( 917438 )

        This isn't something worth worrying about.

        Yeah, but if it gets Bruce Willis out of retirement...

        Come to think of it, I'm not sure if that's a good outcome or not.

      • The Meteor Crater impactor [wikipedia.org] is also estimated to be about 50m, but of a tougher composition (nickel-iron) than Tunguska's.

        Presumably it didn't kill any people when it hit ~50kyr ago, but today Nukemap [nuclearsecrecy.com] estimates 20 fatalities and 90 injuries for a 10MT equivalent burst at that remote desert location. Although I suspect it ignores the nearby I-40 traffic.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Briareos ( 21163 )

        If it hits near a population center (very unlikely), some people will die, but most far less than other natural disasters like hurricanes or earthquakes.

        So you're saying that the people that will die due to this will die only a little bit?

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by mysidia ( 191772 )

      The odds aren't that low... 1 in 500... and there are >30k near earth astroids known.
      What do you think the odds are of us not surviving until 2046 due to some other reason?

      Put it this way: The odds of getting struck by lightning are 1 in a million, and yet people are struck every year. If you could get 1 in 500 odds to win a million $, then that $10 lottery ticket would be worth it.

  • A newly discovered asteroid roughly the size of an Olympic swimming pool

    How many nanowales does that make?

  • And work together and be prepared for the worst, .. Oh darn we are so screwed! 23 years is not long enough for humanity to grow the **** up and put aside our petty differences for a common good.

    • Put aside our differences? Hahaha, are you smoking some good shit or just kidding? I'll be surprised if we even last 23 years squabbling, that itself would be an achievement I'd settle for. With this Ukraine shit and follow-on wars escalating over time.

    • Eh. NASA's figured out how to flick these rocks out the way anyway. She's all good.

      We're free to absolutely anihilate each other, screw up pandemic plans, vote in idiots, vote out idiots and replace them with the opposing idiot and wage war against all being for a few more decades yet....

      • Re: (Score:3)

        by Muros ( 1167213 )

        vote in idiots, vote out idiots and replace them with the opposing idiot

        If only there were other options.

    • You didn't see the movie? A year is more than enough.

    • 23 years? Pffft, I'm no longer in office by then.

    • A lot less than 23 years, when 99942 (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/99942_Apophis) comes through the neighborhood in 2029. And by neighborhood, I mean "inside geosynchronous orbit of earth".

      The plots show it missing the moon (that would be exciting!) but I haven't seen anything about all the geosync satellites. The real interesting scenario would be a collision that changes its path slightly so that there's a collision with Earth on the next go-around in 2036.

      I feel like there has to be a viable movie plot

  • I looked up the Torino scale (Score:5, Informative)

    by physicsphairy ( 720718 ) on Friday March 10, 2023 @03:01AM (#63357901)

    I looked up the Torino scale [wikipedia.org] and a 1 is defined as

    A routine discovery in which a pass near Earth is predicted that poses no unusual level of danger. Current calculations show a collision is extremely unlikely with no cause for public attention or public concern. New telescopic observations very likely will lead to reassignment to Level 0.

    • Re: (Score:3)

      by Meneth ( 872868 )
      Such reassignments to 0 have been done, over the past 20 years, for every asteroid ranked 1. Most of them within a month or two.

    • Re:I looked up the Torino scale (Score:5, Informative)

      by test321 ( 8891681 ) on Friday March 10, 2023 @05:45AM (#63358063)

      There is no need for public concern, still I'd like to know what would happen if it fell on a city. So here it is: https://simulator.down2earth.e... [down2earth.eu]

      Data: 25 km/s (TFA), 50 m diameter; we assume porous rock and impact on sedimentary rock (a city).

      Results:
      Crater depth 83 m
      Crater width 390 m
      Burst altitude 13,631 m
      Break-up altitude 78,656 m
      Wind velocity 9 m/s
      Richter magnitude 0
      Sound pulse amplitude 72 dB

      --> it buries a large block (390 m ~ 1/4 mile), and probably collapses all buildings in an entire city.

      • Only 29% of the earth's surface is land. 2.7% of world's land is occupied by urban development : http://www.newgeography.com/co... [newgeography.com]

      • Re: (Score:1)

        by Anonymous Coward

        I'd imagine the angle of incidence has a lot to do with it. If it "skims" the atmosphere, it'll have a lot more time to burn up or explode first, limiting its effect at ground level. If it hits the earth "dead on", then it'll come in at whatever velocity it's at, and remain roughly whole until it hits the surface, as it won't have had time to fully heat up and break apart.

    • Shhhh. We need an excuse to not do anything about climate change, and global annihilation before 2050 is as good as any. Now excuse me while I run the heater with the window open while offering a blessing to the asteroid gods. The end is neigh!

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Snard ( 61584 )
      It is sort of sad to have developed a scale with values from 1 to 10, which will have all measurements of 0 and the occasional 1, followed by a single measurement higher than that which results in all life on earth being destroyed, so no more measurements can be made.
    • At current odds of 1:560, there is a ~99.8% probability of reclassification to zero and 0.2% of reclassification to 8 (based on roughly 10MT kinetic energy).

  • It'll be folks attempting to dissolve the Constitution and liberty, and those destined to be abused resisting with resultant oceans of flowing blood in at least the USA. Not so much overseas, they don't have 1 1/2 guns for every last citizen, and will be more easily enslaved, but those believing in liberty here will resist mightily, and possibly destroy pretty much everything about the USA.

    • Not so much overseas, they don't have 1 1/2 guns for every last citizen

      True. In Australia, for example, they have 4 for each one.

      We don't even need guns to kill each other, anyway.

      • Where did you get that number from? did you mean "Australian civilians now own more than 3.5 million registered firearms, an average of four for each licensed gun owner". The key being, 4 per licensed gun owner, not all Australians.

        Almost no one has guns in Australia other than farmers, ranchers, e.g. people in the middle of no where. According to wiki, Australia has 0.145 guns per person while the USA has 1.2 guns per person. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by necro81 ( 917438 )
      I reread your comment a few times, trying desperately to understand what the hell your point is supposed to be. Weren't we talking about asteroids?

      • Somebody got too caught up in thinking this is a world-ender asteroid, jumped the gun a bit, hopped into their favorite destruction of society prophecy, and got lost in it. Nothing to see here. Move along.

  • No need to worry about climate change anymore!

  • That wasn't satire, it was just a predated documentary.
    But seen the rate at which Idiocracy is becoming reality, I wonder if we will be still around in 23 years.

  • the better.

  • Not exactly an extinction event sized rock but let's hope it hits someplace unpopulated or the sea.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by necro81 ( 917438 )

      Not exactly an extinction event sized rock but let's hope it hits someplace unpopulated or the sea.

      Yeah, I'll get the popcorn ready!

  • Donâ(TM)t panic. If we donâ(TM)t look at it, it doesnâ(TM)t exist.

  • A torino of 1 is this: "A routine discovery in which a pass near Earth is predicted that poses no unusual level of danger. Current calculations show a collision is extremely unlikely with no cause for public attention or public concern. New telescopic observations very likely will lead to reassignment to Level 0. "

    Sounds like a big nothing burger to me.

  • Maybe we should put money on this. Then at least if it does hit the earth, it won't be a total loss!

    • I really dislike headlines like this. An asteroid impact from an asteroid we detect and measure is not a random event, there are no "odds" of it hitting us - it either is going to hit or it isn't.*

      The correct statement is "the uncertainty in the trajectory projections is such that collision cannot be ruled out with a probability of 1/560."

      This is a very different statement from "there is a 1/560 chance of the thing hitting us."

      It's no wonder the public has such a hard time with risk assessment, when culture

      • I'm not sure I follow your distinction.

        The trajectory of this asteroid does have an element of randomness, or at least uncertainty, due to things like the margin of error in our measurements, and interaction with the gravitational pull of the myriad objects it may come near while on its path towards earth.

        More specifically, what is the difference between "odds" and "probability"? To me, those are two words for the same concept.

        • A key distinction is that with more measurements of the asteroid what changes is the confidence in the claim that the collision will occur (or not), not an actual change in the probability of the collision occurring.

          That 1/560 is not the "probability of collision" - it's the probability the estimate incorrectly states no collision.

    • Lets form a pool. $10 gets you a 1 KM2 area on the globe. Assuming that all the surface of the globe is subscribed, the lucky winner who picked the area that the asteroid hits gets $5.1 Billion. And of course, if the asteroid misses earth entirely, the house keeps all the money.

  • DART was successful in changing the trajectory of it's target. The technology/hardware is already here. Is NASA planning to make one with appropriate mass and see what it can do?

  • Why give us speed in seconds? Nobody does that.
    Yet they can give the human analogy of a pool.
    Boggle.

  • Finally! (Score:3)

    by Randseed ( 132501 ) on Friday March 10, 2023 @10:36AM (#63358711)

    with a potential impact on Valentine's Day in 2046

    Cool. Finally something to look forward to on Valentine's Day for Slashdotters.

  • will use *anything* but metric. And if anyone here can't do metric, than they're not vaguely "nerds".

  • Assuming an average density of 3 to 4 grams per cubic cm (average density of most asteroids) and an impact velocity of 18 km/sec, then it would have an energy release of about 8 to 10 megatons. A rather large amount, but not excessively so considering the 50 megaton yield of the Tsar Bomba test back in 1961. And if there would be an impact, it wouldn't have any radioactive fallout. Just a rather large "boom".

  • What if the asteroid misses the earth, but hits the moon? Could it push the moon out of its orbit around earth? That would be even more fatal for us, than if it hits somewhere on earth...

    • It would make a pretty light we might see from Earth. The change in orbital velocity for the Moon would be negligible to anyone but scientists, and even they'd have trouble measuring it.

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