Fear Fest: Apophis!
OCTOBER 4th, Apophis
“What happens if a big asteroid hits Earth? Judging from realistic simulations involving a sledge hammer and a common laboratory frog, we can assume it will be pretty bad.”
-Dave Barry
Hello again, the Dude here dishing some wisdom out for free. So, stop what you’re doing, minimize that porn site you have open, you can leave the sound on, it will add ambiance, and stay a while.
Today we’re going off planet to discover a fear. Apophis. Now, if you don’t know what that is, I’m sure you will in 20 to 30 years. My goal is to get you digging your fallout shelter today. Apophis is a near-Earth asteroid that was discovered in 2004 and got as high as level 4 on the Torino Impact scale. Now, I’m not a scientician, so when I say we’re all going to die, you may want to pause and consider researching it for yourself. I can give you the numbers. Apophis is 350 meters in diameter (1,150ft). So just imagine a rock the size of the Eiffel Tower breaking us like a cue ball.
Here’s the sticky widget. Apophis was originally set to hit us in 2029 … and by supposed to hit, I mean it has a 2.7% chance of that. However, because it may pass through what is called a gravitational keyhole (How sciencey is THAT term) it may come around and hit us on April 13th, 2036. Fortunately, that is a Sunday, so most praying folk will already be at church, leaving us heathens to consider our live and wonder if we should have done more. I’m not going to worry much as I’ll be 65, and probably ready for death … that is if we haven’t invented robot bodies yet.
Apophis has roughly a 1 in 250,000 chance in hitting us. That’s not so bad, but let’s looks at other odds of mortality. According to a National Safety Council study, your odds by year are …
1 in 18,585 chance of dying in a car accident
1 in 81,524 chance of death by exposure to smoke, fire, and flames
1 in 107,668 chance of death from being poisoned
1 in 354,319 chance of dying in a plane crash
1 in 436,994 chance of dying in a boating accident
1 in 5,005,564 chance of being killed from a lightning strike
Suddenly being killed in a conflagration from the sky doesn’t seem so out there huh?
THE ANSWER: Since NASA will no longer receive public funding, you’d think we be fucked. However, the European Space Agency has been working on a probe that will deflect NEOs. They have such faith in the project that they named it Don Quixote … wait, that doesn’t seem right.