Can humans stop an asteroid apocalypse on Earth? NASA, SpaceX to the rescue?
Several asteroids have reportedly passed close to earth in the past few months. Considering the long Earth history that is replete with tales of such asteroid crashes, there is always a fear that this may happen again. An asteroid crash wiped out dinosaurs, the same can happen to humans too. So, there has always been a fear of massive asteroids colliding with Earth with fatal consequences to humans. When this happened millions of years ago, dinosaurs were completely wiped out. Now it is being speculated that a massive asteroid can crash into Earth again. This has especially happened after the recent Hollywood movie, 'Don't Look Up'. While researchers at NASA, and other space agencies, have been trying to derive a method that could protect Earth from an asteroid crash, a new study has revealed a novel idea to destroy incoming asteroids.
In a recent study, scientists at the University of California found how mankind may avoid extinction at the hands of an asteroid. The researchers have conducted their study on hypothetical protagonists just six month’s notice before an impact by a 10km comet like the Netflix flick ‘Don’t Look Up.’
Philip Lubin, Alexander N. Cohen wrote that they have conducted their work on bolide fragmentation by using an array of penetrators modified with small nuclear explosive devices (NED) in the penetrators. The article was titled 'Don't Forget to Look Up'. They added that the NED combined with heavy lift launch assets with positive C3 such as NASA SLS (Space Launch System) or SpaceX Starship (with in-orbit refueling) is sufficient to diminish this existential threat. They said, “We show that humanity has crossed a technological threshold to prevent us from going the way of the dinosaurs.”
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