What if a never-before-seen asteroid barreling in our direction was likely to strike Earth?
That’s the hypothetical scenario NASA astronomers tested with a recent simulation in which officials attempted to plan for an asteroid that had a 72% chance of hitting Earth in just 14 years.
After the theoretical timeline was posed to a group of nearly 100 government representatives in April, NASA found that the best plan they made to counter the horrifying doomsday scenario had several “high-level gaps,” according to their presentation.
“The uncertainties in these initial conditions for the exercise allowed participants to consider a particularly challenging set of circumstances,” Lindley Johnson, planetary defense officer emeritus at NASA Headquarters in Washington, said in a news release.
“A large asteroid impact is potentially the only natural disaster humanity has the technology to predict years in advance and take action to prevent.”
In the exercise, asteroid sizes ranged from 60 to 800 meters, with the most likely size to occur being between 100 and 320 meters.
To complicate the scenario, scientists said the looming asteroid then passed behind the Sun, making it impossible to observe from Earth for at least seven months.
The experiment was the first to use data from NASA’s DART (Double Asteroid Redirection Test) mission, the first technology for defending Earth against potential asteroid impacts.
NASA notes in their release that applying this technology to an actual threat would require “many years of advance planning,” however the test stood as a way for the agency to measure readiness for a potential threat of an asteroid.
“These outcomes will help to shape future exercises and studies to ensure NASA and other government agencies continue improving planetary defense preparedness,” said Johnson.
