Oumuamua

[Tiki Tom]

Just my luck, that's the year I'm planning to retire!

The odds for that asteroid strike have now gone up. It is now a 1 in 48 chance.

https://www.the-sun.com/tech/13562947/chilling-new-telescope-photos-city-killer-asteroid/

 

[Tiki Tom]

Updated to 1 in 38 chance. This is not heading in the right direction!

https://www.independent.co.uk/space/asteroid-2024-yr4-nasa-earth-chances-b2700006.html

Risk corridor is apparently south of North America and Europe. (But I note that Hawaii seems to be on/near the path!). As you can see, some very large cities are in danger.

 

[Leather_nube]

Time to increase scientists and international space agency funding eh.

Why not increase scientists pay to be inline with football, soccer, baseball, and basketball players?

I’m confident that the best paid people on the planet will come up with solutions for virus outbreaks and potential asteroid impacts.

90m strikes me as a doable problem though.

 

[Olumin]

Against asteroids/comets there are a few viable solutions:

Change the objects trajectory/orbit enough so that it misses earth. This can be accomplished by detonations in close proximity to the object or an impactor (effectively "pushing" it). For this to be effective it requires data of the objects composition and density, as to not destroy or fracture it by accident.

Total or partial destruction of the asteroid. Total destruction would mean vaporisation accomplished via a single or a series of fusion warheads. This is impractical or impossible for objects past a certain size, as this would require Giga or Teraton warheads. Partial destruction can be effective if done early enough to leave the resulting debris field enough time to spread out, resulting in most of the asteroid missing earth.

For a 90m object, it might be cheaper to simply evacuate the affected area and rebuild.