New York 'wiped off the face of the Earth': a training 'collision' with an asteroid failed

The first planetary exercises, the task of which was to work out the scenario of a possible collision of the Earth with a large asteroid, could not prevent the coming Armageddon - although scientists managed to significantly reduce its scale, writes BBC.

Photo: @ESAOPERATIONS

As a result, according to the legend of the exercises, a fragment of asteroid 2019 PDC with a diameter of about 60 meters nevertheless entered the atmosphere of our planet at a speed of about 19 km/s - and on April 29, 2027, exploded over Central Park in New York.

The energy of the explosion was about 20 megatons of TNT - this is more than a thousand times more powerful than the nuclear charge that destroyed Hiroshima, and only three times less powerful than the Tsar Bomb, the most powerful thermonuclear weapon ever tested.

The exercise began last Monday as part of the World Conference on Defense of the Planet. The approaching Earth asteroid 2019 PDC, with a diameter of about 300 meters, was “discovered” eight years before a potential impact. Initially, scientists estimated the probability of a disaster at 1/50000, but as the trajectory became more precise, it became clear that a collision was inevitable.

On the subject: Why are we afraid of a dangerous asteroid, and what really flies to Earth

The scenario being worked out is quite realistic. Today, the list of potentially dangerous celestial bodies includes: 74 space objectsthat threaten Earth with a possible collision. And the list is constantly updated.

Catastrophic collisions with cosmic bodies in the history of the Earth happened. One of them, 66 a million years ago, caused the mass extinction of life forms that lived on our planet in the Mesozoic era, including dinosaurs.

New York "wiped off the face of the Earth"

Over the past week, NASA, the European Space Agency (ESA) and their partners around the world have been trying to prevent global catastrophe through exercises - but their efforts have been only partially successful.

According to a mature hypothetical scenario, NASA sent an exploration mission to the asteroid by 2021, in order to clarify its size, composition and orbit. As a result, it was possible to confirm that the collision should completely destroy Denver and the surrounding area.

The United States, in collaboration with Europe, Russia, Japan and China, began building six aircraft that would crash onto the surface of the asteroid in the hope of changing its trajectory.

While construction was underway and they were waiting for the right moment to launch, another two years passed: the devices were launched only in August 2024 - and three of them successfully completed the mission. But although the main part of the 300-meter 2019 PDC was pushed out of orbit, a broken piece measuring from 50 to 80 meters continued its journey to Earth.

Photo: @ esaoperations @ ESAOPERATIONS

As reported by Agence France-Press, during an exercise in Washington, Washington considered the option of knocking down an asteroid shard while approaching with a nuclear charge, but this was never done due to political differences.

The authorities began to prepare for a “catastrophe.” Six months before the collision, it became clear that it would occur in the New York area. In two months, the city will be completely wiped off the face of the Earth: the asteroid will destroy all life within a radius of 15 km from the explosion.

29 April 2027, the asteroid entered the atmosphere at a speed of almost 70 thousand km / h and exploded at an altitude of about 15 km above Central Park.

Crisis mortgage and other unanswered questions

The space exercises raised a huge number of questions. For example, how and where to evacuate approximately 10 million people - especially if people know in advance that they will never be able to return to their own homes?

How to prepare for such an explosion? To secure nuclear facilities located in the zone of a possible strike, chemical plants? How, after all, to evacuate museums and priceless artifacts stored there?

And how will the locals behave?

“If you know in advance that in six months your house will be destroyed and you will never return to it, will you continue to pay the mortgage?” asks Victoria Andrews, deputy director of planetary defense at NASA.

A huge number of legal issues also arise. For example, what should insurance companies do - especially given the fact that the US authorities saved Denver but destroyed New York? According to experts, in this case the government of the country will be obliged to pay compensation to the victims.

Of course, the likelihood of such a development of events is negligible, emphasizes the developer of the exercise, NASA engineer Paul Chodas: “But we wanted to see what problems such a scenario would cause - and discuss them.”

The next such planetary exercise will take place in 2021 in Vienna. According to Khodas, it is likely that one of the European cities will then be “in the line of fire.”

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