A menacing asteroid could bring Earth’s often feuding nations together, at least for a while.
Dealing with a large, dangerous asteroid that appears to have our planet in its sights will require a healthy dose of international cooperation, experts say — and it’s best to start thinking about that scenario now, while we have enough time to outline the potential reaction. framework.
The United Nations (UN) has developed “procedures for responding to tsunamis and other major events,” Leviticus “LA” Lewis, US Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) detailer for NASA’s Planetary Defense Coordination Office (PDCO), said during a press release. briefing on Thursday (June 20). “But in the case of an asteroid impact, we think the scale will be such that we really need to discuss at this point what would be required for an international response on such a large scale,” he added.
Part of that response would include coordinating the evacuation of people in the potential impact zone, which would likely cover a large swath of the earth, given how fast asteroids move through space and how difficult it is to capture the trajectory of a newly found asteroid. (Small uncertainties in this calculated trajectory would lead to large differences in the predicted point of impact with Earth. And the newly found space rocks are the ones we need to worry about; none of the large asteroids we already know pose a threat to our planet in the foreseeable future .)
“If we’re talking about multiple nations and people having to move and respond to a very large area, that can be a problem,” Lewis said. “We need to get organized and start discussing what would really require a major effort to coordinate. And who would be in charge? What organization? How would we set it up? Would it be the United Nations? Would it be a combination of international organizations?” How would we actually achieve this, that is a new challenge?
Lewis discussed the results of the fifth Planetary Defense Interagency Tabletop Exercise, an asteroid threat simulation, held April 2-3 at the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory (APL) in Maryland.
The exercise – the fifth of its kind by researchers following similar efforts in 2013, 2014, 2016 and 2022 – aimed to “inform and assess our ability as a nation to respond effectively to the threat of a potentially hazardous asteroid or comet.” NASA officials said in a statement.
The participants—nearly 100 people from various U.S. federal agencies and international institutions—considered the following hypothetical scenario: Scientists have just discovered a relatively large asteroid that appears to be on a trajectory to impact Earth. There is a 72% chance that it will hit our planet on July 12, 2038 along a long corridor that includes major cities such as Dallas, Memphis, Madrid and Algiers.
But this is only an initial snapshot with many key facts still unclear or unknown. For example, it is unclear how large the asteroid is; its estimated size range is 200 feet to 2,600 feet (60 to 800 meters). And researchers don’t know its composition, which is a very important detail; a dense metallic or stony asteroid would behave very differently—both in a potential deflection attempt and upon impact—than a “rubble pile” of clay and gravel like Bennu, a space rock visited and sampled by NASA’s OSIRIS-REx probe a few years ago.
“The uncertainties in these initial exercise conditions allowed participants to consider a particularly challenging set of circumstances,” Lindley Johnson, planetary defense officer emeritus at NASA Headquarters in Washington, said in the same statement. “A large asteroid impact is potentially the only natural disaster that humanity has the technology to predict years in advance and take measures to prevent.”
Related: Potentially Dangerous Asteroids (Images)
More information about the newfound space rock won’t be available for some time: The exercise determined that it had just disappeared behind the Sun from Earth’s perspective, making further telescope observations impossible for another seven months.
Participants in an April exercise organized by PDCO and FEMA, with assistance from the US State Department’s Office of Space Affairs, discussed possible next steps.
They explored three main options for the near future, one of which was to do nothing until further telescope observations could be made. The remaining two were to begin studying and possibly developing a probe mission to the threatening space rock—either a flyby or another purpose-built rendezvous that would approach the asteroid for a longer stretch.
The flyover would likely cost $200 to $400 million. The cost of a rendezvous mission would be steeper – in the neighborhood of $800 million to $1 billion.
Most exercise leaders favored two or three options, but noted [that] political realities would limit immediate action,” reads the initial report on the simulation, which can be found here.
This report contains a selection of comments from anonymous exercise participants. “The highlight of the morning was the discussion about the political nature of decision-making,” read one such comment.
Another emphasized the global nature of the challenge, as did Lewis: “Early international engagement will be critical. That credibility is essential and must be established now.”
The exercise did not lead to any hard and fast rules to follow when a threatening asteroid is discovered. (And planetary defense experts say it’s really a matter of “when” rather than “if;” at some point, a large space rock will be headed our way.) But no such regulations were expected; rather, the main objective was to discuss the options and become more familiar with the steps the scientific and international community would take to deal with an incoming asteroid.
“The actual plan, the specific results of the exercise are not really anything,” Johnson said at a briefing Thursday. “The real purpose of this exercise is to actually go through the process of planning and working together, communicating and collaborating.”