Will Nuclear Megaton Shockwave Avert Earth-Bound Asteroid?

A well-placed nuclear explosion could actually save humanity from a big asteroid hurtling toward Earth, just like in the movies, a new study suggests.

Scientists at Los Alamos National Laboratory, a United States Department of Energy facility in New Mexico, used a supercomputer to model nukes’ anti-asteroid effectiveness.

They attacked a 1,650-foot-long (500-meter) space rock with a 1-megaton nuclear weapon — about 50 times more powerful than the U.S. blast inflicted on Nagasaki, Japan, to help end World War II. The results were encouraging. “Ultimately this 1-megaton blast will disrupt all of the rocks in the rockpile of this asteroid, and if this were an Earth-crossing asteroid, would fully mitigate the hazard represented by the initial asteroid itself,”

zen-haven.dk...

Pretty cool article about the possibility to change the trajectory of an inbound asteroid on course with Earth. It's nice to know there's something to try instead of waiting for things to hit us like apophis neo.jpl.nasa.gov... in 2029 and 2036.

reply to post by PageAlaCearl


The only thing I'd be worried about would be the effects of radiation fallout back onto the planet. But for the most part, it sounds like a good idea, I just hope blowing up the asteroid does not produce smaller fragments that could pose additional threats to Earth.

sounds like a movie i seen a bunch of years back!
some dude named bruce willis was in it,and another guy called ben something!
man can try as he may,but you cannot stop the power of god!

Originally posted by reficul
sounds like a movie i seen a bunch of years back!
some dude named bruce willis was in it,and another guy called ben something!

man can try as he may,but you cannot stop the power of god!

Sounds like a future Michael Bay movie, because I know I've already seen it.

reply to post by satron


i liked the other movie better with the black president! better foreshadowing!

reply to post by Unvarnished


I wouldnt worry about the radiation from a wee little nuclear bomb, the sun bombards the earth with radiation every day. Luckily we have our OZONE layer

reply to post by loneranger26


Not to mention all the aerial nuke tests we've done (and the USSR back in the day)....

That really wouldn't be a concern. The real problem comes in when you're talking bigger asteroids. The one that killed the dinosaurs was much, much larger, over 6 miles (10km). That's a far cry from the 1600m one in the simulation, and would need an exponentially larger blast to deflect it.

I'd like to see them put THOSE numbers in that computer, and recalculate our chances. On second though, I don't want to see it, because I feel I already know what our chances would be...

On the movies, was kind of weird as I recall, as they both came out about the same time...Deep Impact and Armageddon were the films. Both had about the same story, sending spacecraft to the asteroid to blow it up with nukes, so it was easy to mix up the two. Deep Impact was a better emotional and scientific movie, whereas Armageddon was a better action movie. (in my opinion)