It made for one of the worst movies of all time, but the plot of Armageddon is now the operational plans for the European Space Agency. The ESA plans to fire a satellite at an asteroid in 2015 to see if it can destroy (or change the course) of an asteroid. Since Armageddon almost destroyed the career of Bruce Willis, there is hope for ESA.
The target may be a 1600ft-wide asteroid called 99942 Apophis, which has a one in 250,000 chance of hitting Earth in 2036. They will use Hidalgo, which will ram into the asteroid at a speed of around six miles a second. That is either a space craft or, with Spain’s plunge into bankruptcy, the Europeans are playing to shoot persons of the Spanish nobility into space.
Source: Daily Mail
Slartibartfast,
Don’t kid yourself. The Core is far, far more outrageous than Armageddon. Spaceflight is at least possible. If one were to try that nonsense in The Core, it would be quicker to just sacrifice the people inside the craft to Pele (the goddess that lives in Kīlauea, not the asteroid bearing her name) and avoid all the construction costs.
A simple and technologically feasible approach to changing the orbit of a threatening asteroid is the “gravity tractor.” It’s basically a high-mass spacecraft that flies alongside the asteroid, countering their mutual gravitational attraction with a constant, low-power thrust from something like an ion engine. (An ion engine is used by NASA’s Dawn spacecraft now orbiting the asteroid Vesta.) Over many years – or, more likely, decades – the slight deflection of the asteroid’s orbit would be enough to make it miss the Earth. A major advantage of this approach is that since it doesn’t require a landing, it would work no matter what the asteroid’s composition and spin rate is. A brief article about the concept is available at New Scientist, http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn8291
Of course, the slippery slope this technology creates was noted by Carl Sagan, who said that great care should be taken in deciding to develop it, because once you have the ability to make an asteroid MISS the Earth, you automatically have the ability to make an asteroid HIT it.
Geeba Geeba,
From a physics point of view, the only other movie that could compete is “The Core”, and while that was possibly more outrageous (it’s a tossup), I think that “Armageddon” was closer to actual human experience and thus more damaging to people’s actual understanding of physics. It’s hard to appreciate Liv Tyler when you’re bleeding from the ears or hurling heavy objects at the screen…
Reminds me of all the “nuke it” blather that developed during the Deepwater Horizon catastrophe.
Why are scientists infected with the “nuke it” meme when they know we must pass gently into the night sky?
There is an interesting theory of the case on that …
All you people are missing the point of this outrageous accusation. One of the worst movies of all time? We all have varied opinions of “art” but there are many more that are much stinkier than this. Way over the top — yes indeed and it will never be confused with Casablanca. Believe it or not it was nominated for 4 Oscars, got another 12 wins and 27 nominations from an alphabet soup of associations, and cleared at least $60M, according to IMDB. And most of all, any flick is worth at least a modicum of “fair” rating when one gets to experience the acting (and all that other non-acting) prowess of Liv Tyler.
Homina, homina, homina!
There is an interesting issue here – this might have risk, but the only way to know that is if you understand the science of what’s being done (which I don’t claim to, by the way – I’m just making a wild guess as to the branch of science involved). I don’t think our institutions have any mechanism for evaluating this, so (at least right now) it’s just up to the judgement of the people who have the wherewithal to do such things whether or not they should be done. Somehow, this doesn’t seem like the best idea in the world to me…
I think we should try this on a smaller scale first. Throw a tennis ball, then throw a pea at it. See which one the dog chases. I already know which one the dog will spit out. I know this because I took two semesters of Physics 101. I liked the first one so much that the Professor insisted I take it again.
Berliner,
The JPL guy’s talk on weak orbital boundaries was very impressive – they took a failed vehicle in earth orbit (it was supposed shoot a pod into lunar orbit [because it was there, I think] but it missed or something) with minimal remaining delta-vee and got it into lunar orbit on a 5-month trajectory. At the boundaries of gravitational influence trajectories display sensitive dependence on initial conditions and if you can do the math (no mean feat) and don’t mind waiting, you can get around the solar system very cheaply. Same thing probably applies to diverting asteroids – you give it a small tap when its in just the right place and you can move it to a completely different orbit.
“… I don’t see how its infinitesimal momentum can affect the trajectory of the asteroid. …”
Just a few fractions of a degree would add up over the 23 years (The impact of the satellite was planned at 2013 and the (then thought to be dangerously) near flyby of 99942 Apophis is 2036).
Jay,
Even a nuclear explosive wouldn’t be able to affect the momentum that much unless it shaped and located in a manner to maximize its effect. Even then the mass of anything that’s a threat makes even that kind of effect relatively small. That being said, I saw a talk that a guy from JPL gave on weak orbital boundaries – basically using sensitive dependence on initial conditions to plot low-cost trajectories and small amounts of delta-vee to send objects on their way. This was nearly a decade ago, so I’m guessing that they are probably using a more advanced version of this technology….
Unless the missile has an enormous nuclear warhead, I don’t see how its infinitesimal momentum can affect the trajectory of the asteroid.
“How about trying it on an asteroid that has no chance of hitting Earth first.”
Gene,
An excellent idea. We should develop the capability for the future, but it makes little sense to do an experiment that may easily go astray.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YDBbEG-0pfQ&feature=player_embedded
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YDBbEG-0pfQ&w=425&h=349%5D
Gene,
Your idea makes entirely too much sense to be implemented…
How about trying it on an asteroid that has no chance of hitting Earth first.
A review of the physics in Armageddon (by astronomer Phil Plait) :
http://www.badastronomy.com/bad/movies/armpitageddon.html
Given the likely present inertial speed of the asteroid itself and the difference in mass of the satellite (even at 6mi/sec) I can’t imagine the impact having much effect at all. Maybe they’re just looking at it as target practice…or a garbage dump run as the Herr Turley pointed out.
Now, what possibly could go wrong? Flying into a moving object at speed is filled with uncertainties. Ask any baseball batter. Furthermore, the surface is likely to be rough, whereas at least a baseball has a predictable smooth surface. What will the force vectors be like on impact? Who knows, because there are too many variables.
If I were going to try and move an object’s orbit, I would want to do it the same way we reposition man-made satellites. Push gently and steadily. Do a soft landing on the object, then fire thrusters–which absolutely must be positioned accurately.
As I said, what could possibly go wrong? Beware the Law of Unintended Consequences. Someone once pointed out that God likes a good joke; after all, He invented humor.
Didn’t we already do that?
And by “The ESA plans to…” the Daily Mail actually means “Back in 2005 ESA did a concept of Mission Don Quijote“.
“Concept” and “2005” are rather important, given the fact that in 2009 the Jet Propulsion Laboratory reaccessed the impact probability, making the whole mission rather moot…