SCI/TECH: NASA Cant Wait To Smash Spacecraft

This 4th of July, NASA will use a spacecraft called Deep Impact to intercept and use part of the spacecraft to collide with the comet Tempel 1. The purpose of this mission is to collect dust and ice samples from the comet, so that scientist can study the possiblity of comets' "DNA" makeup. The spacecraft is due to launch in mid-January for intercpetion 4 July.



I really want to see the footage, hopefully see live feed of this on the 4th of July. Just to see what a comet really does have around, like portrayed in movies and so forth. Not to mention, what new types of chemical balances, solid mixtures, metals or any other alien materials are to be found that can not be found here on earth. This could lead to exciting new theories about space and possibly answer some of those daunting questions that only have theoretical answers.



[edit on 2-1-2005 by Banshee]

I don't know, but i think this could be one of those stupid things that NASA comes up with once in a while. That i know the comet is going to be close enough to Earth that the explosion can be seen..... What i wonder is....how in the world is NASA going to make sure none of the chunks of rock they blow up comes down our way?......

This reminds me of the other stupid contingency plan that NASA scientists came up with....to use a big enough meteor or asteroid to bump Earth away from the path of an incoming asteroid, or if the sun starts acting up to use one of these astral bodies to get us farther away from the sun..... To me that sounds like a very stupid plan....just like blowing up a comet that would be anywhere close to Earth.....well except if the astral body was in a collision course with Earth or the Moon, i am not sure this is the case here thou.



[edit on 2-1-2005 by Muaddib]

[edit on 2-1-2005 by Muaddib]

I looked for the distance that the comet would be from Earth at time of impact. It will be 134 million km, or 0.894 AU, according to the following link.

deepimpact.jpl.nasa.gov...

www.msnbc.msn.com...

The above link is to information about a simliar mission by Spain named after Don Quijote. This was in the news months ago, before NASA announced its similar mission. And now NASA is launching way ahead of schedule. Is there any significance?

I do not know if there is any correlation, i remember reporting this a couple months ago or so, the thread must be somewhere in these forums.

I looked for the thread but it seems to be gone now.

Ah, found it, i used the Spanish spelling for "Quijote" that's why i couldn't find it before.

www.abovetopsecret.com...

[edit on 2-1-2005 by Muaddib]

Ha, Ha, I got my name on the CD that they put on the impactor. This is great science as we can not explore space without materials, and it would take trillions of dollars to get those materials into space from Earth. We need asteroids, and comets.

Bode

Don't forget moons. If I could get a business loan for an asteroid mining ship or an ore processing plant on the moon, I'd make billions. The trick would be to exploit automation, so you'd never have to send people. Use a modular design that basically drops, unfolds, and starts working. It's a gold mine, pardon the pun. Speaking of gold, is there any on the moon?

so on the july 4th 2005 a space craft is upposed to land on a metour?
am i wrong can't the heat be extremly high on a mertour?

WyrdeOne,
I don't know about the Moon, but I remember reading that a 1 mile asteroid would contain enough material to supply the world w/ a 2 yr supply of nickel and iron and 200 million ounces of precious metals. That would be about 500 or more billion dollars worth of metal if used in orbit(I used 3X Earth prices as a mark. It could be alot more.)

The Moon could be used for material and to eventually replace all energy production(solar energy stations) leaving oil and coal for hydrocarbon raw materials.

Bode Bliss

i don't think it is a good idea to mess around with the Moon, and extracting minerals, or studying comets/asteroids etc that are nowhere close to the path of the Earth is fine, but this comet is just too close to be messing around with it.