What is Digg?186 Comments
- Sornos, on 12/29/2007, -0/+76Wouldn't it be hilarious after all this time that the mission be ended by an asteroid?
- satanatnmtedu, on 12/29/2007, -3/+61The chance of it hitting Mars is the same it always has been. What has changed is the assessment of that chance.
- maci01, on 12/29/2007, -1/+58Mars would move out of orbit pushing back Earth at an angle that will reverse global warming.
Just kidding. - JasonCox, on 12/29/2007, -1/+54For the love of the gods please let this happen, this would be bigger than Shoemaker-Levy 9 hitting Jupiter! The first time we'd be able to observe an asteroid impact on a planet similar in makeup to Earth!
- TheDHC, on 12/29/2007, -1/+46let's hope the NASA rovers are safe
- Nobiting, on 12/29/2007, -3/+41"Scientists are quickly formulating a plan which if successful will move the Red Planet 50 miles out of harms way."
What the hell? - KaJuN4, on 12/29/2007, -0/+37Martian asteroid impact dust. Don't breathe this!
- popothebright, on 12/29/2007, -0/+35We could have a gamma ray burst in a neighboring star. It would destroy all life on earth, and we wouldn't get any warning at all.
Which is why it's sort of pointless to worry about these things... - rupprupp29, on 12/29/2007, -0/+31Whatever it is, I'm sure it involves Bruce Willis
- Sornos, on 12/29/2007, -0/+30It'll also give us a beautiful view of materials under the surface, and put to rest whether Mars is active or not!
Good time to be an astronomer! - Proctor, on 12/29/2007, -5/+33Rudy Giuliani will blame this on Al Qaeda.
- trotskyist, on 12/29/2007, -0/+26Well, at least we know that any possible life on Mars might be dead in 2 months.
- mzkply, on 12/29/2007, -1/+25Can someone please explain the MapQuest reference ?
- inactive, on 12/29/2007, -2/+24I hope this happens. How freaking cool will it be to get hi-res pictures from the Mars rovers of an asteroid impact? And imagine the debris they can collect afterwards!
- fkr3, on 12/29/2007, -0/+21Given they're not precisely sure if it'll hit Mars, or when, I'm going to go out on a limb and say the official expectation is that "something may or may not happen".
- a1532b, on 12/29/2007, -0/+20The front of "Really big tow trucks weekly" I assume..
- dttn, on 12/29/2007, -0/+20you mean unmars!
- inactive, on 12/29/2007, -0/+20Hope for a terraform!
- inactive, on 12/29/2007, -1/+20And you will claim that Ron Paul will stop it.
- Sornos, on 12/29/2007, -0/+18Space is big. Very big. But things move in very predictable ways. So the accuracy is probably down to less than 0.01%, but that's an error of a few thousand kilometres when you deal with millions.
- SiNN4R, on 12/29/2007, -0/+17Great I was nervous about dying from some cosmic freak occurance and now I'm terrified.
- DeviantDragon, on 12/29/2007, -0/+17Where in the world are you reading this in the linked article?
- Lith25, on 12/29/2007, -1/+17So had this been heading to earth, would we be screwed? It's scary to think they only have a couple months notice on these things.
- Shirleycakes, on 12/29/2007, -0/+16Morgan Freeman has at least a year's notice.
- Iwantawii, on 12/29/2007, -1/+16The impact would crush a part of Mars' surface, revealing much about its history. We just launched another Mars rover that's to land in about 9 months, I think it is. Plus we can observe what happens when a large asteroid smashes into a crusty planet like ours, but from a relatively safe distance. This is big news.
- inactive, on 12/29/2007, -0/+14You may think it's a long way down the street to the chemist, but that's just peanuts to space.
- sockpuppets, on 12/29/2007, -0/+14There's no dinosaurs on mars, silly.
- DivineMonkey, on 12/29/2007, -0/+13Weird, i was just thinking this morning how cool it would be to witness a significant size asteroid hit the Moon or Mars. Wonder what i'll be thinking tomorrow morning...
- fuzzmeister, on 12/29/2007, -0/+12You know, getting smashed by an asteroid would be such an epic way for them to go out, it'd be almost worth it.
- inactive, on 12/29/2007, -3/+15Not from the Decepticons.
- fuzzmeister, on 12/29/2007, -0/+12I'm pretty sure the rovers would sustain a bit more than "significant" damage if they got hit by an asteroid.
- StealthMonkey, on 12/29/2007, -0/+11I hope it does, that would be really cool! I would stay up and watch whatever coverage they had on TV!
- krisscofield, on 12/29/2007, -0/+10I for one will embrace our Libertarian martian leaders.
- emjaymj, on 12/29/2007, -0/+10No skywake, that would only be ironic if the rover was trying to find out information about Mars in order to save it.
- LucasVB, on 12/29/2007, -0/+9Excellent catch.
- branjb, on 12/29/2007, -0/+8So to clarify, this is a good thing, correct? That way we can observe first hand the effects? Or does it mean bad things?
- MacEnvy, on 12/29/2007, -0/+8Considering you live in Canada and I live in the US, I'm guessing the odds are pretty good that you won't hit me. Unless I take a trip to Montreal to pick up some Cuban cigars, or you've got a VERY good arm.
- phreak22, on 12/29/2007, -1/+9Wonder if it'll unearth martian skeletons? ;)
- Neem, on 12/29/2007, -1/+8I think this would be a great opportunity to try to divert an asteroid in a safe scenario.... but I don't think we have the capability of getting a rocket to mars in two months.
- MasterThief117, on 12/29/2007, -0/+7With all the ***** those things have been through, I doubt this will stop them.
- skywake, on 12/29/2007, -1/+8No its not. It would be ironic if the rover in the process of trying to find out information about Mars caused Mars to implode upon itself.
- inactive, on 12/29/2007, -1/+7THEY CAME FROM BEHIND!!!!
- Zaneris, on 12/29/2007, -1/+7It's interesting how incredibly close to the event it is getting with this degree of uncertainty, meanwhile they can rule out near earth impacts 30 years down the road.
- inactive, on 12/29/2007, -0/+6What difference do you expect to see in a small red dot in the sky?
- jgzman, on 12/29/2007, -0/+5it's a question of significant digits and exactness. If the numbers are plus or minus 0.5% that's still a HUGE amount of real distance. As well, there are a great many forces acting on the asteroid, and they may not all be knowable. You know, the stellar cartography version of 'ignore air resistance.'
OK, this was posted on the 27th, let's say at noon, for the sake of argument. Collision slated for 30th, at 2:55 AM. That is a time of 140100 seconds. The asteroid is moving at 12.8km per second, for a total distance (at time of prediction posted) of 1,793,280km.
The diameter of mars is 6,792km, according to NASA.
That means that it has to travel 264 planetary diameters before impact.
I feel that 1/25 isn't bad under the circumstances. I'm sure they will revise their estimates as we go.
Remember folks: Space is BIG! - courtjester555, on 12/29/2007, -0/+5True, but that chance is unknowable and therefore irrelevant. The only pertinent figure is the best chance that scientists can come up with.
Besides, after the actual event, the chances will have been either 100% or 0%. Again, only our current best guess matters. - wbbb617, on 12/29/2007, -0/+5i just wanna know if i will be able to see it in NJ if i buy a telescope
- Nidy1, on 12/29/2007, -1/+6I think it would be ironic if we were all made of iron.
- courtjester555, on 12/29/2007, -0/+5A flash? What would even cause that?
- rockets, on 12/29/2007, -0/+5Mark your calendar too...
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