asteroid

NASA to 'lasso' an asteroid

There could be a sequel in the works to that absurd scene from 1998's "Armageddon" in which Ben Affleck and friends land on a threatening near-Earth asteroid. But this time around it's a real-world NASA mission to kidnap, rather than obliterate, a space rock.

Part of the idea is to conduct research to help prevent just such an "Armageddon" scenario from ever cropping up in real life, according to a mission overview obtained by CBS News last week. The space agency is hoping to lasso an asteroid, space cowboy style, and tow it close enough to Earth so that it can be visited by astronauts. The astronauts then will conduct research that could one day assist in a mission to Mars or save Earth from a catastrophic collision, should Mr. Affleck be unavailable. … Read more

Was that a meteor over New York (and zipping across Twitter)?

Apparently the bright object that people reported seeing shooting over the East Coast of the United States last night -- and that left a glittery trail across Twitter -- may well have been a meteor.

Bill Cooke of NASA's Meteoroid Environmental Office told the Associated Press that, "going on visual reports," the flash was "a single meteor event."

"The thing is probably a yard across. We basically have (had) a boulder enter the atmosphere over the northeast," he added.

The object lit up Twitter last night at about 8 p.m. East Coast … Read more

Parrot's Asteroid app platform lands in Volvo dashboards

Parrot's bringing the lessons learned when developing its Asteroid series of car stereos to the next generation of Volvo cars with the Android-based Sensus Connected Touch platform.

Like the Parrot Asteroid Smart that I recently reviewed, the Sensus Connected Touch is a touch-screen interface that is based on a heavily modified version of Android (likely version 2.3) and will connect to the Internet via a Bluetooth-paired smartphone, Wi-Fi tethered access point, or USB-connected 3G/4G dongle. Also like the Asteroid Smart, Sensus will give its users access to a variety of vehicle specific apps available in Parrot's Asteroid Market, … Read more

Canada orbits suitcase-size camera to hunt asteroids

Aside from giant laser beams, can eyes in the sky help save us from asteroid hits?

Canada thinks so, and it has launched a space telescope to track hazardous objects including asteroids, space junk, and satellites.

The Near-Earth Object Surveillance Satellite (NEOSSat) was launched from an Indian rocket this week as the first dedicated space-based sentinel of its kind.

Managed by the Canadian Space Agency (CSA) and Defence Research and Development Canada (DRDC), NEOSSat is about the size of a suitcase and orbits some 500 miles above Earth, circling every 100 minutes. … Read more

Google removes asteroid doodle before you can see it

It's not easy to celebrate a near miss on the day of an actual hit.

Google discovered this yesterday. The company was very keen to offer another of its highly involving doodles for your weekend enjoyment.

Its nerd-leaning artists thought it might be fun to create a little something that cheered the fact that Asteroid 2012 DA14 wasn't going to strike Earth and create havoc.

Sadly, an ill-timed meteorite did strike Earth and create havoc.… Read more

Crave Ep. 109: The greatest drinking game ever

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This week on Crave, William Shatner has some choice words for J.J. Abrams, and we toss one back in the greatest drinking game ever invented. Cheers! Plus, we dodge a bullet the size of a football field as an asteroid nearly collides with Earth. Phew. … Read more

Odds of dying from an asteroid strike: 1 in 74,817,414

It was a busy day for planet Earth. Asteroid 2012 DA14, a 45-meter wide space rock, sped past the Earth a mere 17,100 miles overhead. In the Ural mountains of Russia, a 15-meter wide, 7,000 metric ton asteroid hit the Earth's atmosphere, creating a 300-kiloton shock wave that injured more than 1,000 people and shattered 1 million square feet of glass.

What are the odds that an asteroid impact will destroy your being in a given year? Slim -- 1 in 74,817,414, according to data compiled by The Economist. For comparison, the odds of … Read more

Congress to hold hearings about killer asteroids

Nothing like news of an asteroid suddenly slamming into western Siberia to arouse the folks in Washington from their preoccupation with political blood sport. So it is that the Science, Space, and Technology Committee now plans to hold a hearing soon "to examine ways to better identify and address asteroids that pose a potential threat to Earth."

Committee Chairman Lamar Smith (R-Texas) alluded to the meteor that exploded in the sky above Russia early this morning. More than 900 injuries, mostly from shattered glass, were reported in the city of Chelyabinsk, about 950 miles east of Moscow. In … Read more

The 404 1,209: Where we chalk it up to cosmic coincidence (podcast)

Leaked from today's 404 episode:

- Fiery meteor explodes over Russia's Ural Mountains; 1,100 injured as shock wave breaks windows.

- Watch asteroid 2012 DA14 fade out via streaming video.

- Iceland wants to ban Internet porn.

- Chubby Checker in a twist over an old app.

- One Direction's new toothbrush streams sound vibrations through your teeth.… Read more

Just in time: Scientists propose vaporizing asteroids

The sky is totally falling.

As if it weren't enough that a meteor boomed across the Russian sky today, shattering windows and injuring about 1,000 people, an asteroid 150 feet across is about to sideswipe our planet.

Asteroid 2012 DA14, while unrelated to the meteor, is just as scary. It will graze us at just 17,200 miles from the surface, passing between Earth and our geosynchronous weather and communications satellites.

Possible asteroid strikes are no joke, and if you ask me (or the dinosaurs), they represent the biggest threat to our planet aside from human stupidity.

Fortunately, some non-stupid humans are finally getting serious about countering this threat. … Read more