191
top 50 comments
sorted by: hot top controversial new old
[-] FreakinSteve@lemmy.world 1 points 18 minutes ago

Can we speed that up a bit?

[-] llamacoffee@lemmy.world 3 points 1 hour ago

Wow this is the most depressing comment section I've ever seen.

[-] Etterra@discuss.online 24 points 19 hours ago

I'm team asteroid.

[-] AbsoluteChicagoDog@lemm.ee 11 points 16 hours ago

Scientists estimate that 2024 YR4 is between 130 to 300 feet (40 and 90 meters) wide, large enough to cause localized devastation near the impact site. The asteroid responsible for the Tunguska event of 1908, which leveled some 500 square miles (1,287 square kilometers) of forest in remote Siberia, was probably about the same size.

So nothing to worry about

[-] threelonmusketeers@sh.itjust.works 1 points 12 hours ago

Provided it enters in a similarly uninhabited location.

[-] Xavienth@lemmygrad.ml 1 points 13 hours ago* (last edited 13 hours ago)

Sarcasm?

Idk about you but if it levels 1287 km² of forest, I don't think that would exactly be good news for a populated area. On the upper range, it could be equivalent to a 40 megatonne bomb.

[-] cazssiew@lemmy.world 24 points 19 hours ago
[-] Thcdenton@lemmy.world 23 points 20 hours ago
[-] blackstampede@sh.itjust.works 4 points 2 hours ago

Unexpected Waterworld dipstick guy

[-] Thcdenton@lemmy.world 1 points 38 minutes ago

He's my go-to for posts like these

[-] DarkFuture@lemmy.world 20 points 21 hours ago

Panic?

I'm crossing my fingers for the wellbeing of the universe. We're awful.

[-] floquant@lemmy.dbzer0.com 13 points 21 hours ago

Worry not, for we are insignificant to the universe.

[-] Zacryon@feddit.org 4 points 20 hours ago
[-] Zetta@mander.xyz 3 points 16 hours ago* (last edited 16 hours ago)

Forever, humanity could only ever conceivably expand so far due to the expansion of the universe, so as far as we know a still insignificant portion of the universe we could colonize.

[-] Zacryon@feddit.org 1 points 4 hours ago

Until we make some scientific breakthrough which might solve that problem. If there is any possible of course. There is so much we still don't know.

[-] Uranus_Hz@lemm.ee 6 points 18 hours ago

Those are rookie numbers. Gotta pump those numbers up.

[-] pjwestin@lemmy.world 13 points 23 hours ago

That's 0.9% more than the last time I checked. I know those are still really low odds, but we can hope...

[-] psud@aussie.zone 3 points 17 hours ago

One of the things they're doing is calculating what it's orbit would have to be to hit the Earth, and where it would have had to have been on its last orbit to be in that orbit

So they can look at any astronomical images of that part of the sky from then and see if it's in the right place

If they find images of the right part of the sky at the right time and the asteroid is not in it, they know it's not on an orbit that will hit the Earth in 2032

[-] xor@lemmy.dbzer0.com 6 points 22 hours ago

don’t worry, it’ll just be like a small nuke, not a planet killer… (until they update the size estimates)

[-] Cform@lemmy.world 35 points 1 day ago
[-] Sterile_Technique@lemmy.world 71 points 1 day ago

Better late than never I guess.

load more comments (2 replies)
[-] Majorllama@lemmy.world 3 points 17 hours ago

Which direction do I need to fart to up those numbers?

[-] Coreidan@lemmy.world 17 points 1 day ago

I’ll only panic if it misses

[-] MrTrono@lemmy.world 88 points 1 day ago

Am I supposed to panic because it's unlikely to hit? Meanwhile I'm out here wishing for death by meteor.

load more comments (14 replies)
[-] HorikBrun@kbin.earth 47 points 1 day ago

Panic?!

You mean throw a welcome party?

[-] InFerNo@lemmy.ml 5 points 1 day ago

If we are able to nudge an asteroid, would an asteroid of this size nudge the earth?

[-] threelonmusketeers@sh.itjust.works 8 points 23 hours ago

Technically the solar system is a multi-body system, and everything nudges everything else, but the mass of the earth is far greater than the mass of the asteroid, to the point that it doesn't matter.

[-] HappyStarDiaz@real.lemmy.fan 7 points 1 day ago

Is there any way to speed this up

[-] parpol@programming.dev 38 points 1 day ago

To people having panic attacks, it is not large enough to destroy the earth, and we would have plenty of time to evacuate the impact location. Though let's hope it isn't anywhere with permafrost.

load more comments (6 replies)
[-] Yawweee877h444@lemmy.world 4 points 1 day ago

Sigh. Why can't it be 109%

This place sucks.

[-] psud@aussie.zone 4 points 17 hours ago

It's not big enough to fix anything. If it hits, it won't hit America or Europe

It's in the big nuke scale of energy, enough to do a lot of damage to a small area. Were it to hit a city, the city would need a lot of rebuilding. Were it to hit, few people would be in danger as we will have years of warning. The only people in the impact area would be "storm chasers" travelling to see the impact

[-] solsangraal@lemmy.zip 31 points 1 day ago

i don't like those odds. anything we can do to bump it up to around 75%-100%?

load more comments (2 replies)
load more comments
view more: next ›
this post was submitted on 07 Feb 2025
191 points (97.5% liked)

Astronomy

4251 readers
200 users here now

founded 3 years ago
MODERATORS