No media coverage of AGU YD impact session
Posted by epgrondine at 17:32, 20 Dec 2009There was no media coverage of the YD impact session held at the AGU
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Exploring the fringes of science and history. Caveat lector!
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23 October 2006
7 weeks 5 days
http://anthropology.net/2009/12/16/more-...
E.P. Grondine
Man and Impact in the Americas
22 November 2004
2 weeks 15 hours
I thought you were part of the media blackout, by suppressing information about this link :)
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We are the cat.
23 October 2006
7 weeks 5 days
Hi earthling -
Let me give you a brief background on impact politics.
David Morrison was one of the early pioneers in this field, but adopted Muller's hypothesis of Nemsis, a nearby large gravitational companion to our solar system, which occasionally would send asteroids our way.
The WISE satellite ($500 million) will be looking for nearby brown dwarfs.
On the other hand, astronomers Clube and Napier realized that our solar system passing through the plane of our galaxy had gravitational effects enough to send comets our way.
NASA leadership has been dominated by manned Mars flight enthusiasts, who view resources devoted to dealing with the impact hazard as a diversion.
As a result of Morrison's efforts, NASA sets the cometary impact hazard at no more than 5% of the total hazard, when in fact it is more likely 95%. They fund the researchers calling into question cometary impact, and do not fund those researching recent comet impacts. Hence their reaction to Firestone et al.
It will cost another $500 million to launch NEO-VIS, which will pick up dead comet fragments.
The next ocean impact will kill 60,000,000 people, the next land impact up to 1,000,000,000 people, unless the impactor is picked up and diverted. These kind of events have been occurring at at rate of about 1 per 1,000 years recently.
We're heading into Comet Schwassmann Wachmann's debris chain in 2022, though any the likely impact will be only in the 5 Kiloton to 15 Megaton range.
Now we return to the question of who hacked the CRU computers.
E.P. Grondine
Man and Impact in the Americas
22 November 2004
2 weeks 15 hours
To the public $500M sounds like a lot of money, so we can't afford it.
The 500 is over several years, isn't it? Including development, tracking, evaluating data and all that.
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We are the cat.
23 October 2006
7 weeks 5 days
Hi earthling -
$500 million is a lot of money - but that's just telescope and launch costs, roughly. It going to take around $20 million per year for data processing. And then there's NEO-VIS, another $500 million, and WISE and NEO-VIS will both have limited lifetimes: replacements will have to be launched.
You're right about the cost/benefit ratio though, and the payback over the years, and its always a pleasure discussing these things with you.
But since you strike me as the free market conservative type, why the hell should the US be picking up the entire tab for this? Maybe we should cut over to free market principles: you pay us some money, and we'll tell you if anything is going to hit near Australia.
E.P. Grondine
Man and Impact in the Americas
22 November 2004
2 weeks 15 hours
actually my link goes to an LA Times article complaining that the latest movie might not make $1 billion, I was being sarcastic.
Consumers spend considerably more on completely frivolous stuff in a single weekend. Ironically consumers have already spent 500M on movies about asteroid strikes.
$500M is the trade volume between the USA and Canada - for half a day.
No, 500M over several years is not a lot of money, especially if we consider that we spend it all down here.
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We are the cat.
23 October 2006
7 weeks 5 days
Yes, it is ironic that more has been spent on movies about impacts than on dealing with the hazard. That probably holds for research on AGW warming as well (The Day after Tomorrow).
E.P. Grondine
Man and Impact in the Americas