What happens if it hits the ground. The probability is small, but it exists: what will happen if an asteroid crashes into the Earth

The researchers analyzed the possible consequences of an asteroid impact and ranked the most dangerous effects in "order of destructiveness."
Illustration by NASA / JPL-Caltech.

A small test from scientists: if an asteroid crashed into the Earth, which of the consequences of this disaster would be the most destructive? Scorching heat, flying debris? Or maybe a tsunami? New research has helped find the answer to this question.

It turns out that strong winds and shock waves are the most dangerous consequences of a meeting with an asteroid for the Earth. To find out, scientists from the UK studied seven effects associated with the impact on our planet in a collision. This list includes extreme high temperatures, shock waves, flying debris, tsunamis, seismic shocks, hurricane winds, and crater formation.

A team from the University of Southampton simulated the fall of 50,000 asteroids to Earth with a diameter of 15 to 400 meters. It is noted that an asteroid with a diameter of 60 meters collides with our planet approximately once every fifteen hundred years, while an asteroid with a diameter of 400 meters reaches the Earth once every hundred thousand years. “The probability of an asteroid impact is really low. But the consequences can be unthinkable, ”admits lead author of the study, Clemens Rumpf. According to him, deadly asteroid strikes are rare, but you need to be prepared for anything and understand in advance how to reduce the number of deaths and destruction.

The research team analyzed the possible consequences of the above seven effects and calculated how many lives could be lost, and then ranked these same effects in the "order of destructiveness" - from the most terrible to the least.

According to the results of the work, the greatest number of victims would have been carried away by the wind and shock waves: according to the experimental scenarios, 60% of people would have died from them. It is assumed that the shock wave of incredible force when the Earth collides with an asteroid should arise from a sharp jump in atmospheric pressure - such that would damage the internal organs of people. As for the wind, its strength will be enough to easily throw human bodies or, for example, turn forests into a flat surface.

The thermal impact that would cover the Earth from impact can take about 30% of human lives. But this can be avoided if the population hides in basements or any other underground structures.

Next on the list are tsunamis, accounting for 20% of human deaths. But there is an important amendment here: the consequences depend on where the asteroid lands. If into the ocean, then it will not be so scary: the wave caused by the collision, moving through the water, will gradually dissipate, and when it reaches the continent it will not be so huge. It is much worse if the asteroid hits land.

The least dangerous were seismic shocks (they accounted for 0.17% of victims) and falling debris of a celestial body (1% of lives). We add that this applies mainly only to large asteroids - those that can create a crater upon impact.

In addition, the team found out the so-called critical dimensions of asteroids: a collision with a celestial body with a diameter of 18 meters or more is capable of causing human casualties. Smaller asteroids are likely to simply disintegrate in the Earth's atmosphere before reaching its surface. And they, fortunately, are more common than their "older brothers".

In their work, scientists gave practical advice on reducing the number of victims. For example, people living in arid regions should be most wary of "rain of fire", which is likely to cause many fires. For small towns facing a collision with an asteroid 30 meters in diameter, it is best to evacuate immediately. But an asteroid with a diameter of about 200 meters, which should fall on a densely populated city, will probably require other measures - perhaps changing the trajectory of a celestial body.

“If only ten people are under attack, then it might be better to evacuate the area. But if danger threatens a million inhabitants, it would be more expedient to launch a mission to deflect the asteroid from its original course, ”explains Rumpf.

The authors also report that this is the first study of its kind: no one has previously considered all the possible consequences of an asteroid collision with our planet. The team will present the results of the work at the International Academy of Astronautics Planetary Defense Conference, which will be held in Tokyo in May.

A scientific article on the results of the study was published in Geophysical Research Letters.

Recall that previously, experts predicted a possible collision of an asteroid with the Earth in October 2017.

Friday the 13th

The Russian segment of the Internet is again in a panic. Numerous "authoritative" sources are sounding the alarm: they say, NASA has determined that the giant asteroid Apophis will crash into the Earth in 12 years. In an extreme case - after 19, "it will smash one of the continents to smithereens," as they promise on one of the sites.

The reason for the current virtual exacerbation is mysterious. The asteroid Apophis did not give any reason to get excited right now. Likewise, NASA specialists did not give them, who, of course, follow this asteroid, but have long ago determined its trajectory. And no new data was published.

On the other hand, according to the information that NASA disseminated before - several years ago, it would be a mistake not to pay close attention to Apophis (aka 2004 NM4, aka 99942). Because he's really dangerous. After all, nothing more dangerous - in the sense of blocks that really threaten our planet with a collision - has not yet been discovered. At one time, senior researcher at the Main Pulkovo Astronomical Observatory Sergei Smirnov Apophis "the most serious cosmic threat to the planet over the past 200 years."

Asteroid 2004 NM4 was discovered in 2004. A year later he received the name Apophis. That was the name of the Egyptian god of darkness and chaos. Astronomers have estimated its trajectory. It turned out to be very disturbing. Even scary: on Friday April 13, 2029, Apophis strove to crash into the Earth. The probability of collision is as much as 3 in 100.

A successful outcome would only delay the inevitable end. Scientists feared that in 2029 the gravitational effect of our planet would change the trajectory of the asteroid's flight so much that during the next approach - in 2036 - it would necessarily crash.

On January 9, 2013, Apophis flew from Earth at a distance of 14.5 million kilometers and came into the field of radar. NASA astronomers, armed with data collected in the previous two years by various observatories, including space ones,. It turned out that the fears were exaggerated.

According to updated calculations, in 2029, Apophis will fly by. Although it will be very close to the Earth - about 32 thousand kilometers from its surface. Will be visible without telescopes.

It seems to carry over in 2036. Experts from the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena have recalculated the probability of the "God of darkness" colliding with the Earth. And instead of 1 in 45,000, as previously estimated, they brought 1 in 250,000.

The likelihood of a collision in the next dangerous encounter - in 2068 - is even less. She was rated 1 in 400,000.

Observations made it possible to clarify the size of Apophis. It was believed to be about 300 meters across. It turned out to be more - about 340 meters.

NASA has repeatedly guaranteed that a collision of Apophis with the Earth is out of the question. However, it did not become calmer. The current aggravation is proof of this.

Why is it scary? Because scientists find reason to scare from time to time. Even counting the probability of a collision. After all, even scanty - it still exists. This means that the asteroid can crash into the Earth. This is the first thing.

Second, the asteroid is indeed capable of changing its flight trajectory thanks to an effect discovered by Russian engineer Ivan Yarkovsky. The effect is created by the Sun. Creates in the event that the asteroid rotates. Getting under the rays, its surface heats up, hiding it cools. At the same time, it emits photons - the heated side is larger than the cold one. As a result, a small but constantly acting reactive force arises. She is able to "move" the asteroid. It is difficult to take into account the Yarkovsky effect in calculations; therefore, they may be erroneous.

Thirdly, a number of scientists argue that it is generally impossible to calculate exactly which trajectory Apophis will fly after 2029. Relevant arguments, for example, are given by Russian scientists from St. Petersburg State University in the journal:

“When approaching, scattering of trajectories occurs, with scattering a loss of accuracy. As a result, the trajectory of the asteroid Apophis may become non-deterministic ... "

Therefore, now it is generally too early to say whether the God of darkness will have mercy on us or punish us with a terrible blow. It will be possible to determine more precisely after 209. Unless NASA was wrong with a favorable forecast.

What if?

Contrary to apocalyptic sentiments, Apophis does not promise the end of the world - it is too small to ruin life on Earth. It won't even cause a "nuclear winter". Significant destruction is expected within a radius of 10 kilometers from the fall, partial - within a radius of 50 kilometers, and within a radius of 100 kilometers only plaster will crumble, and glass will fly out in some places.

Of course, if a block falls into a densely populated area, numerous victims cannot be avoided. The TNT equivalent of the explosion will be 1600-1800 megatons of energy. At the site of the explosion, a crater with a diameter of 5-6 kilometers is formed.

What if the asteroid crashes into the water? There will be no global catastrophe either.

Norwegian scientists, led by Galen Gisler of the University of Oslo at the Los Alamos National Laboratory, have estimated the consequences of the fall of a lump the size of Apophis into the ocean. It turned out that the asteroid will raise waves several hundred meters high. But after 30 kilometers from the epicenter they will drop to 60 meters, after a thousand kilometers they will become 10 meters.

It is clear that the most dangerous strike will be struck near the coast. And not only because of the tsunami. According to Giesler, the fall will cause hurricane winds, lifting billions of tons of water into the atmosphere. The explosion will throw them at a speed of 300 meters per second for about 20 kilometers. Spreading laterally, this spray will sweep away everything in its path.

By the way, scientists also figured out the place of the most likely collision of Apophis with the Earth in 2036. Most likely it will fall into the water. If it does fall. And from the land our Siberia is under threat. Just like in 1908. The body that fell then is called the Tunguska meteorite.

Total: we will live 2029, specifically until Friday the 13th, and then we'll see.

NASA has identified three "catastrophic" dates - 2029, 2036 and 2068, but they assure that there is no threat to life on Earth.

What happens if a comet or an asteroid hits the ground? Why are comet impacts dangerous in size, after all, immeasurably smaller than the Earth? Prominent British astronomer Sir Fred Hoyle argues that a collision of the Earth with even a 300-meter meteorite could provoke the onset of an ice age.Moreover, it is the impacts of meteorites and comets that are responsible for the rapid onset and end of ice ages, as well as changes in the thickness of the ice shell. during these periods. The explanation is simple. Meteorites, as you know, are stone and iron, and the former are found several times more often than the latter. When a meteorite falls with a diameter of more than 300 m, a huge amount of dust is thrown into the upper atmosphere - its weight can be thousands of times the mass of the meteorite itself. Fine stone dust, no more than half a micron in size, can float in the atmosphere for about ten years, which will lead to the cooling of the ocean and the formation of ice crystals, usually melting under the influence of heat released by the earth's surface. These ice crystals reflect a significant part of the solar radiation, thus provoking the onset of the ice age. Well, when an iron meteorite falls, the opposite process takes place: metal dust appears, absorbing heat and interfering with the formation of ice crystals. The earth begins to heat up, the ice melts quickly, and a new planetary catastrophe begins.
A similar event could well have caused the death of a tenth species of megafauna about 11,600 years ago, at the beginning of the Ice Age. The swiftly onset thaw turned vast expanses of tundra bound by permafrost into one continuous swamp. The giant mammoths did not starve to death - they were simply sucked in by the quagmire. Note that it was at this time that the death of Atlantis described by Plato took place.
Mathematical modeling on a computer showed that when a comet with a diameter of one kilometer falls to the Earth, a tsunami wave is formed with a height of almost one hundred meters, and the atmosphere temporarily becomes acidic. According to geological data, about 5 thousand years ago, a small ice age ended with a flood, and a huge wave caused by the fall of a meteorite swept over the entire land, not reaching only the tops of the mountain ranges. Some researchers associate the worldwide flood described in the Bible with the death of Sodom and Gomorrah, ancient cities destroyed by fire and brimstone that fell from the sky.
Dolen and Delay in the book "When the Earth almost perished" (collected over 500 legends of various peoples, which speak of those events. In most cases, a fire storm is described, extinguished, in fact, by this flood. The fall from the sky of ice blocks and stones is often mentioned , bloody rains, mirror-like seas, "copper sky", giant tsunamis, boiling rivers and lakes.
All this is the reality of a cosmic catastrophe. The Mirror Sea - an ice field consisting of cometary debris - could have appeared even before the cometary nucleus fell and continued to replenish after the fall. There are reports of hailstones weighing 50 kg, the frozen gases (dry ice) present in the comet's body, when falling into the water, created a boiling effect. It is curious that in the bones of animals found in glacial deposits, an increased content of iron and silicon is often found, the source of which could well be the cometary nucleus.
Stop, stop! - the attentive reader will exclaim. - Can you trust "grandmother's tales"? And a collision with a meteorite or comet is, in general, an accidental phenomenon and its probability is extremely low. And if so, then what is there to fear?

Yes, we will answer, it would be so if it were a game of chance. However, there are good reasons - obtained, by the way, with the help of generally accepted scientific methods - to believe that the case has nothing to do with it ...

20-07-2017, 14:42

Last month, American astronomers from the observatory in Arizona, observing outer space, saw a new asteroid in the solar system that could become potentially dangerous for earthlings. Today, the Ural researchers again disturbed the society with the impending threat. They said that the "space rock" is moving towards our planet at a tremendous speed. This asteroid has already approached a potentially dangerous distance, and will "fly up" to the Earth as much as possible in a few days - on July 22. What will happen? Is humanity threatened with death again? Will the Apocalypse come?

Potentially dangerous asteroids

The space organization NASA constantly monitors the movement of asteroids in our planetary system. The latter cannot collide with each other in any way (they have their own orbits), but the cosmic stones, plowing the vastness of the Universe, do not obey such laws. Recall that there are two places in the solar system from which asteroids can "descend" - this is the asteroid belt located between Mars and Jupiter, as well as the Kuiper belt beyond the orbit of Neptune.

The "Mars-Jupiter" belt is mainly the debris of an ancient planet that crashed into the red "neighbor" in the distant past, as well as debris that broke away from Mars itself as a result of this bombing. However, this group of cosmic bodies is getting poorer every year, since over the long centuries most of the "cosmic stones" flew away from it. Only the largest debris, in particular, Ceres and Vesta, remained in place.

The Kuiper Belt is another matter entirely. They are small pieces of stone that have never been able to unite and form full-fledged planets. They are trans-Neptunian objects, as they are concentrated beyond the orbit of Neptune. These include the ex-planet Pluto, which is now considered a dwarf formation, which has its own satellite (Charon).

The second group of asteroids is the most dangerous for the inhabitants of the Earth, because there are many asteroids in the Kuiper belt, they are of different sizes and shapes, and they are also far away and have not yet been properly studied. In addition, they may include objects that were not previously included in the solar system. They could be debris from planets that broke away from a supernova explosion. Such bodies, like the unknown Planet X, can approach the Sun every tens of thousands of years, bringing us a potential danger.

What kind of body is approaching the Earth this time?

Asteroid 2017 MV1 should approach our planet on July 22 of this year at about 12:45 Moscow time. The celestial body is dangerous for its huge size and proximity to the Earth. It will "fly up" to a distance of 8.7 million kilometers at a speed of about 86.5 kilometers per hour. While some researchers see it as a great danger, others do not share their ideas, claiming that the asteroid will fly by.

By the way, this is not the first message about the approach of an asteroid. So, in January this year, scientists promised us a collision with an asteroid with a diameter of 300 meters. Two more potentially dangerous space bodies flew near the Earth in mid-June and early July.

Prior to that, American researchers predicted that more than nine hundred asteroids would fly near the Earth during 2017. Most of the trajectories of these objects pass beyond the orbit of the Moon, but their course can also change in the event of collisions with other "space boulders". It is possible that one of the asteroids will crash into our natural satellite.

The dimensions of the new space "stone" are enormous. Scientists estimate it will be about 1,100 kilometers in diameter. If we compare this body with the Chelyabinsk meteorite that fell to the Earth, the latter will seem like a grain of sand relative to the dimensions of this "space rock", because it weighed about 10 tons and 17 meters in diameter.

Will this asteroid crash into Earth?

It is theoretically possible, but this probability does not exceed ten percent. Therefore, there is no need to be afraid. If the asteroid is flying from the Kuiper belt, then it will fly past the gas giants Neptune, Saturn, Uranus and Jupiter. Any of these huge planets is capable of "pulling" this "cosmic rock" into its orbit. Also on the path of the asteroid is Mars, which it can also collide with, because it will pass in close proximity to it.

Near the Earth, it will be eight million kilometers, and this distance is enough to avoid the collision of the "cosmic rock" with our "cradle of life." The Earth, most likely, will not attract the asteroid to itself, and it will fly by, like other objects plowing the vastness of the Universe.

Other approaching asteroids

By the way, in October scientists "predict" a new catastrophe on a global scale. In autumn, an asteroid, code-named TC4, should approach our planet. Its dimensions will be twice as large as the already mentioned Chelyabinsk meteorite. But the most positive news is that European astronomers from ESA are talking about the probability of collision of this "rock" with the Earth, which is one chance in a million.

The biggest threat to our Earth, apparently, will be the asteroid Didymos, which will reach our planet's orbit in 2022. But NASA's aerospace agency promises to save humanity again. Having tested one of their latest technologies to prevent the Earth from colliding with asteroids and other space bodies flying in our direction. At the heart of their work is a kinetic impact on the launched orbiter, which will slow down the movement of the object and change its trajectory.

We are predicted to collide with all kinds of asteroids and unknown planets (Nibiru) almost every year, but a global catastrophe did not happen either in 2000 or in 2012, therefore, in 2017, mankind is also unlikely to expect mass death, cataclysms are, of course, possible, but they are not able to erase all living things from the face of the Earth in the near future. This is comforting.

Natalie Lee - RIA VistaNews correspondent