Saving Planet Earth
By: Alex, Sami, Maddy, and Adam
Asteroid Vs. Meteors
An asteroid is smaller than a plant and are sometimes pulled out of asteroid belts. A meteor is a typical piece of comet dust no lager than a grain of rice. An asteroid has no atmosphere but are large enough to exert a gravitational pull. A meteor is the flash of light we see in the night sky when a small chunk of interplanetary debris burns up as it passes our atmosphere.
A Meteor Hitting Earth
Asteroid Belt
Asteroid Hitting The Earth
Impact on Earth
For all of Earth's life, Earth has been getting hit by asteroids. There was an asteroid that as about 30-50 meters in diameter and it was formed 50,000 years ago and it hit Earth. People have found about 120 craters on Earth that has been made by an asteroid and there are more to be found. One of the craters are 1200 meters in diameter and 200 meters deep.
Safety percautions
The most useful action is to create a reliable detection and tracking system that allows early warning, build a large self-sustaining bio-domebunkers, or a deep underground and away from the point of impact.
Solutions to stop an asteroid
Enter NASA's alternative "kinetic interceptor," which would deflect an incoming asteroid by smacking into it. Like shooting a rolling bowling ball with a pellet gun, the idea is to just barely nudge the asteroid off course -- but not hard enough to fracture it. According to Space.com, a mere 1 mile-per-hour (1.6 kilometer-per-hour) impact would be enough to divert an asteroid by 170,000 miles (273,500 kilometers) if we hit it 20 years before the predicted collision.
Map
Illustration of a meteor shower