[extropy-chat] NEO deflection

[The Avantguardian]

--- Adrian Tymes <wingcat at pacbell.net> wrote:

> --- The Avantguardian <avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com>
> wrote:
> > The second, if we are feeling confident, is to
> park
> > the asteroid in earth orbit and use it as a raw
> > material source and orbital platform for the
> > construction of a space elevator or a large
> > non-landing spacecraft for manned expeditions to
> the
> > other planets. We can drill it and set nuclear
> charges
> > in it to "scuttle" it, in the event that its orbit
> > starts to decay although we should also have a
> > contigency plan to time this with a temporary
> > world-wide shutdown of the power grid to avoid EMP
> > damage.
> 
> You're not going to be able to implement said
> shutdown.  It doesn't
> matter if there's an orbital strike with a possible
> EMP; some
> countries would rather take their chances.  

Yeah. Well the dinosuars didn't have a chance to work
together to avoid their common fate. I was just being
courteous is all.

> That said, it would be of much use if we got
> practice moving relatively
> small asteroids - say, meteors that would harmlessly
> burn up in the
> Earth's atmosphere if they accidentally entered it -
> into Earth orbit.
> These rocks could be mined, if they had much useful
> material, or simply
> used as shells for orbital construction.  (And the
> first ones would no
> doubt be of significant scientific interest.  One
> might possibly be
> able to cover the costs of the mission as a
> scientific project alone,
> with funding from relevant agencies.)
> 
> I wonder if, say, one could send a probe to the
> Geminids (which are
> generated by the B-type asteroid 3200 Phaethon),
> have it spend some
> time studying them, then prep them for insertion
> into stable Earth
> orbit as the next meteor shower approached?

Yeah this and a deep impact type mission to MN2004 to
determine its true mass, composition, and structual
integrity. We could even use the expected range of
possible masses based on our current estimate of 46
million metric tons to use this nudge to make orbital
insertion or "shooting the moon" next time around
easier or even just stall for time.



The Avantguardian 
is 
Stuart LaForge
alt email: stuart"AT"ucla.edu

"The surest sign of intelligent life in the universe is that they haven't attempted to contact us." 
-Bill Watterson

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