Scientists predict Chelyabinsk like meteorite event ahead

Scientists have predicted Chelyabinsk like meteorite explosion events in the future also, which may have much more hazardous effects on the Earth.

At a recent panel of the Association of Space Explorers in New York, physicist and former astronaut Ed Lu warned that there are about 10,000 known asteroids orbiting our region of the solar system.

Lu’s B612 Foundation is planning to help launch a space-based infrared telescope in 2018 that can detect the heat emitted by asteroids, map their position and orbit, then provide a warning in time to mount an international effort to deflect the more dangerous ones.

According to recent scientific studies published in the journals Nature and Science, the possibility of these dangerous asteroids entering Earth’s atmosphere may be greater than previously believed.

Physicist Paul Wiegert of the University of Western Ontario and an author of a study of the Chelyabinsk meteor said, “Chelyabinsk didn’t really create as much damage as we might have expected, and that’s a good thing. The flip side is that we are now starting to discover that events like the Chelyabinsk event are occurring more frequently than we had originally anticipated. But we’ll have to wait a little while longer and collect a little more information before we can know for sure.”

The scientists at the University of California described the 20-metre Chelyabinsk meteoroid strike that injured around 1200 people as “a wake-up call”.

Chelyabinsk was the largest meteoroid strike since the Tunguska event of 1908, and modern technology provides an unprecedented opportunity to study such an event, researchers said. The Chelyabinsk meteorite belongs to the most common type of meteorite, an “ordinary chondrite.”

Meanwhile, the officials at NASA’s Near Earth Object program, which scans the heavens for dangerous objects, say the space agency is reassessing what size rocks to look for and how often they are likely to hit.




Source: Pentagonpost.com