Answers to Everyday Questions : What’s the likelihood of a large asteroid heading towards Earth or a nuclear device exploding?

What’s the likelihood of a large asteroid heading towards Earth or a nuclear device exploding?

10 Responses to “What’s the likelihood of a large asteroid heading towards Earth or a nuclear device exploding?”

1. hey said :
   August 27th, 2010 at 3:22 am

   we’d be dead
2. straydog said :
   August 27th, 2010 at 3:25 am

   Thankfully we have The Sun, Jupiter, Neptune, Saturn… as asteroid defence. Their huge gravity fields attract many dangerous asteroids before they could reach earth… but that doesn’t mean they can’t slip through… just added safety.

   The USA’s supercomputers are on full pelt to monitor the US’s nuclear stockpile and the likely…. I’ve forgotten the correct term….. well where it wears down and becomes unstable. Unfortunately other countries don’t take such precautions and don’t particularly look after their nuclear material so well. Theres also many USSR nuclear suitcases still out there… one of which could easily take out all of London… with fall-out devastation just stopping short of Manchester.
3. Trixie Bordello said :
   August 27th, 2010 at 4:05 am

   It’s possible but as far as is known, not probable.Hollywood is entertaining but a bit OTT, but if the worst threatens, we always have Bruce Willis et. al. to fall back on, so to speak!
4. harryb said :
   August 27th, 2010 at 4:34 am

   Well, as a Astronomer said recently, “We`ve been hit before(by meteors) and we`re gonna be hit again”.
5. Graham I said :
   August 27th, 2010 at 5:13 am

   The likelihood of a large asteroid heading towards Earth is approximately 100%, it’s only a question of when it will happen and whether we’ll be able to do anything about it. The last such event was about 65 million years ago, and it could happen again at any time, but then again if it doesn’t happen for another million years, we’ve got quite a long time to figure out how to prevent it causing problems. If it happens next week, of course……. NASA has a program where they’re continually identifying large asteroids and predicting their trajectory, so that hopefully we’ll get some warning, but there’s still a chance there’s one they haven’t spotted yet. The probable consequences would be widespread devastation near the impact site, followed by severe climactic change, probably accompanied by widespread extinction of plants and animal species, possibly though not necessarily including human beings.

   The likelihood of a nuclear device exploding is rather low unless someone does it deliberately. The probable consequences would depend on the size and type of device and where it was detonated, but in general it would cause widespread devastation over a much smaller area than an asteroid would, but would generate a great deal of radiation which would render a wide area unsafe for generations to come.
6. brainyandy said :
   August 27th, 2010 at 6:06 am

   I wouldn’t like to put odds on either, but I can tell you the latter is far more likely to happen than the former!
7. EDWARD W said :
   August 27th, 2010 at 6:31 am

   It will never happen.
8. emptyheed said :
   August 27th, 2010 at 7:16 am

   am fae glesga m8 we,d still just set aboot ye
9. Realdolby said :
   August 27th, 2010 at 8:10 am

   The likelihood is the same as you giving
   me the 10points for you being so deppressing.
10. phil said :
    August 27th, 2010 at 8:55 am

    humanity would become seriously dead.