The U.S. federal government is summoning the world's top scientists to an urgent conference this summer to plan defenses against an attack that could wipe out an American city or disrupt the whole country's infrastructure.
No, it's not global terrorism.
The scientists will map ways to combat an asteroid attack, a cosmic sucker punch like the collision that killed the dinosaurs 65 million years ago and flattened a Siberian forest in 1908.
While the world's attention is focused on the real threat of terrorism, the theoretical asteroid menace has been garnering a surprising amount of behind-the-scenes attention.
Britain's Royal Astronomical Society hosted an international meeting of experts on the asteroid impact threat in December. In January the world's astronomers petitioned Australia's government to fund a special asteroid-detecting telescope. In February NASA announced the "Workshop on Scientific Requirements for Mitigation of Hazardous Comets and Asteroids," which will be conducted in Washington in September. In March, NASA activated "Sentry," a new system to monitor near-Earth objects (NEOs) and assess their threat to Earth.
NEOs are small objects—asteroids and certain comets—that orbit in the solar system relatively close to Earth and could one day collide with Earth.
"We've had a couple of close shaves during the past few months," says Brian G. Marsden, with the Harvard
Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics in Cambridge, Massachusetts.
One asteroid caused public jitters when discovered March 12. Named 2002 EM7, it came from the direction of the sun—an astronomical blind spot where objects are hidden in the sun's glare.
Astronomers didn't detect 2002 EM7 until four days after it came within 288,000 miles (460,000 kilometers) of Earth, which they regarded as a close encounter. [The moon is about 239,000 miles, or 385,000 kilometers, from the Earth.]
The asteroid was about 200 feet (60 meters) in diameter—big enough to fill two-thirds of a football field—and could have flattened a city, unleashing the energy of a five-megaton nuclear bomb.
"I think Mother Nature has given us yet another wake-up call," says Donald K.
Halley’s Comet or Comet Halley is a comet who orbits earth every 74.5 years! This comet is also the most known comet ever to be documented! Halley is very interesting comet.
There is an ongoing debate on the issue of weaponizing space in order to protect our national space assets and achieve national strategic objectives. This is an issue because of the increase of more space faring nations trying to exploit the benefits of space and other nations also trying to develop capabilities to disrupt other from using it. This background paper will outline the current international laws and policies, our national policies in regard to space, current issues that catalyzed this debate, the benefits and disadvantage of weaponizing space.
Armageddon begins by showing the destruction of the Earth by an asteroid 65 million years ago, when the dinosaurs inhabited the earth. According to the narration, the asteroid is said to have been six miles wide, with the power of 10,000 nuclear weapons. The after effects were trillions of tons of dirt and rock thrown into the atmosphere, creating a blanket of dust that the sun was unable to penetrate for 1,000 years. The narrator explained that it happened once, and that it would happen again, it was only a matter of when.
In the movie and short story, The secret life of Walter Mitty, the main conflict is that he doesn’t have self confidence which is shown throughout both the movie and the short story. For example in the movie, he is not able to talk to the girl he is interested in, Sheryl. Mitty does not have the courage to talk to her because his self esteem is low due to the fact that he lets everyone walk over him. Furthermore, in the short story the main conflict is also that he has no self confidence but in the story it’s because of his wife, Mrs. Mitty. She doesn't think that he can do anything for himself because she also thinks so low of Mitty “Does it ever occur to you that I am sometimes thinking?”(304). Just like in the movie Mitty lets people walk
One theme from The Secret Life Of Walter Mitty is that your mind and imagination are very powerful. In the story, he dreamed of being a famous surgeon. “ ‘Coreopsis has set in,’... ‘If you would take over, Mitty?’...’If you wish.”(3). By others asking if he would take over with something difficult to treat, it shows how skilled he dreams of being. However, in reality, he is not a surgeon. In the movie, the theme is that imagining you can do something can get you to what you want to do. Walter imagined being with Cheryll and standing up to Ted, the guy who was firing everyone from Life headquarters. At the end of the movie, both of these things happened. The theme in the movie is a more inspiring theme that viewers can
The film The Secret Life of Walter Mitty, directed by Ben Stiller, thoughtfully explores the timeless theme of identity: through Walter (played by Stiller), Stiller reminds that adversity is necessary in one’s life in order to bring about growth and change. Through the detailed presentation of the minutiae of Walter Mitty’s day, the viewer understands that he is a man stuck in a rut of existing rather than living. The film opens with images of Walter’s apartment: nothing out of place, nothing with colour, even Walter, himself, is dressed in black and white. Despite this mundane opening, there are elements of humor (an error sending a wink on a dating site and dreams of super-human rescue missions), and this accurately depicts Walter’s internal
Hip-hop started out in the Bronx in New York City with DJ Clive “Cool Herc” Campbell. A man of Jamaica, he essentially birthed the new genre of music by carrying over the Jamaican tradition of Toasting, which “is boastful poetry or over a melody provided by a deejay.” (ROOTS ‘n’ RAP, rice.edu) Its creation can be accredited to the record spinning DJ’s of the clubs of the 1970s. From this, the Master of Ceremonies (MC) was created. He would come up with creative rhymed phrases that could be delivered over a beat or acapella at dance clubs. They consisted of boasts, insults, “uptown throw downs”, and political commentary. From there, hip-hop only grew more and more popular. Being that it was created in a dominantly African American neighborhood, it became a tool for blacks to express their problems with society and be heard by the rest of the country. Though it was a microphone for African Americans to express themselves to the rest of the country, there were some other things that happened within the black community through hip-hop as well. One of these things was a diss track.
Asteroids can be found orbiting the Sun in a belt between Mars and Jupiter; this is called the Asteroid belt or Main belt. The asteroid belt has been said to probably contain millions of asteroids that are all different. There are more than 20,000 numbered asteroids. Some times asteroids get knocked off the asteroid belt. As asteroids revolve around the Sun in elliptical orbits, Jupiter’s gravity and getting to close to Mars or another asteroid can change an asteroids path, this could send an asteroid out of the asteroid belt and into space across the orbits of other planets. An example of asteroid orbits changing is Mar’s moons Phobos and Deimos. These were asteroids that went to close to Mars and got caught in its orbit.
James Thurber is the author of “The Secret Life of Walter Mitty”. He feels inferior to his wife throughout his marriage. He learns to express these feelings through writing short stories and illustrating cartoons. This is a way for him to escape his everyday life with his wife. Critics have acknowledged Mitty motif, which is used to describe his two major themes in many of his major works such as “The Secret Life of Walter Mitty” (Morsberger 66). “The Secret Life of Walter Witty” is one of the most well know short stories by James Thurber (Morsberger 44). His themes are evident throughout the story. Also, he is able to become alive through the story by expressing imagination. “The Secret Life of Walter Mitty” explores the main themes of disharmony between the sexes, males’ escaping routine, and life as a married couple.
It had originally planned a return mission to the Moon, the Constellation Program, but with the forced cancellation of that project, NASA has now turned its attention to two possible exploration missions: The Asteroid Redirect Mission (ARM) and a manned mission to Mars. These are the most essential exploration missions that require the most attention and funding. The ARM consists of NASA launching an unmanned probe that will travel to an asteroid “close” to Earth. It will then capture the asteroid and transport it back and place it in orbit around the moon. This will provide NASA an opportunity to essentially “mine” an asteroid and discover exactly what minerals are stored in asteroids. The success of this mission could potentially lead to a new source of materials that may not even exist on Earth. In his book titled “Entering Space,” Aerospace engineer, Robert Zubrin speculates that an asteroid 1 kilometer in diameter would contain $150 billion in platinum alone (Zubrin, 146). Platinum is the rarest metal on our planet and there have been estimates that one-fifth of everything we use or manufacture contains platinum. Furthermore, Zubrin states, “there are over 5,000 asteroids known today” (Zubrin, 147). One asteroid can yield billions in potential resources, if there was a push to mine these asteroids, the U.S. as well as the world’s economy could rise to unimaginable levels. The first step to accomplishing this task is giving NASA the required funding to develop spacecraft that are capable of reaching these objects. With current propulsion systems, the idea of traveling to asteroids is not likely, nor profitable. Zubrin argues “it can safely be said that useful trade between Earth… and any other body in the Main Belt using chemical propulsion is probably impossible” (Zubrin, 149). This means that current rocket technology is not anywhere near
The Secret Life of Walter Mitty”, the power behind the imagination is revealed. The use of the narrative point of view, the clear juxtaposition of Mitty’s real life and imagination, as well as the diction, allegories, and symbolism used contribute to the theme in various ways.
“Sheltered as we are by Earth's atmosphere and magnetic field, which deflect lethal radiation from space, we are like coddled children who have never ventured into a tough neighborhood” (Folger 2). Humans have been fascinated with space since the beginning of our time. Just like children and rough neighborhoods, we have tackled obstacle over obstacle to make it home again. In the end, we have a better knowledge and strength than before. The future of space exploration can assist us in answering the everlasting question of how the universe came to be. The more we explore the infinite galaxies, the more we can scientifically discover and create new technologies as science advances. As we continue to discover, we can create new fields and occupations for aspiring young students like myself.
asteroid was on a line with Earth, the computer would show us and enable us
Asteroids are mysterious rocks in space that are deadly to living things on Earth. Asteroids have hit multiple planets every day, including earth, many times before, that's what people say what killed the Dinosaurs, with no doubt asteroids are dangerous for humans and animals. We have known about asteriods for many many years. More then you could ever imagine. We have known that they hit us and planets everyday or even once a week for it to hit earth. Anyway this peice will tell you the dangers, the wonders, and the facts about astiroids. (NASA Team, pg. 2)
It is a wonder to marvel about how much debris man has created over the span of approximately 50 years. Sadly, this is nothing new on our planet. However, little is known, or at least in regards to public awareness, about the celestial landfill that man has created since the early days of the Space Race involving the Russian launching of Sputnik. Ever since then, the repercussions of the US versus Russia mechanized frenzy have snowballed into an estimated 6,600 satellites being launched, in addition to 1,000 that are still active now.