<p>A large meteorite entered the atmosphere and exploded over a Russian city in the Ural Mountains. Although damage seems to be relativeley small, lots of buildings lost windows. CNN reported that hundreds were seeking medical attention.</p>
<p>Meanwhile, a large space rock, totally unrelated to the one that scared the Russians, will fly by us missing the Earth by a measly 17,000 miles:</p>
<p>CNN has the following message on their Breaking News page: “Asteroid to make close pass about 2:24 pm ET, flying about 17,200 miles above Earth’s surface. Experts say it won’t hit.” </p>
<p>That’s what the Russian officials apparenty did - and did the right thing, IMO. They knew when the space rock would explode and where, but did not issue any warnings. What would be greater - damage form meterorite explosion or mass anarchy and riots?</p>
<p>BTW, we are OK now. Got a text from Mr B that said, "In case they confused inches with centimeters again - love you. " LOL.</p>
<p>Other than this one report, I don’t get a sense from any of the news reporting I have read that Russian officials had any idea this meteorite was coming… not sure I believe that they did.</p>
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<p>If there is one part of our space program that we ought to be adequately funding, it is asteroid detection and deflection research. We COULD potentially identify, and deflect asteroids like the one passing close today (if we thought it would hit us), but we are going to end up going the way of the dinosaurs (literally) if we don’t start putting some resources into this. Our opposable thumbs won’t mean a thing if we just twiddle them and ignore this.</p>
<p>I keep thinking that in primitive/ancient times, entire religions may have been founded on the basis of events like that meteor explosion. Can you imagine how people would have reacted to the burst of light and and sonic boom without any understanding of what had happened? It would have seemed perfectly obvious that an angry god had hurled a lightning bolt in response to some human transgression.</p>
<p>There was a story about this exact subject on the ABC evening news last night. A group of former astronauts and NASA astronomers plan to launch an asteroid-hunting space telescope into space in search of asteroids that could impact the earth. It’s called the Sentinel mission.</p>
<p>Sounds only logical, given the ramifications of a massive asteroid impacting the planet. We’ve been extremely lucky thus far. But most astronomers agree it’s only a matter of time before our luck runs out. Unless we develop technology to deflect the next big one off-path, we all may as well bend over and kiss it good-bye. But with the current dysfunction in government, which shows no sign of lessening, what are the chances that NASA will receive the funding necessary for R & D? We may have to rely on the Chinese to keep our bacon out of the fire, sad to say. And I shudder to imagine the fate of the planet resting with them.</p>
<p>Well, if the meteorite had blown out thousands of windows in Washington DC yesterday instead of in Russia I bet NASA would have a much easier time getting the funding.</p>
Got a text from Mr B that said, "In case they confused inches with centimeters again - love you. " LOL.</p>