Space Rock Misses Mars, Barely

gLing · 02-01-2008, 02:08 AM

Quote:

An asteroid once thought to be on a collision course with Mars passed the Red Planet today without incident.

Astronomers first estimated that asteroid 2007 WD5 had as high as a 3.6 percent chance of striking the planet. Newer observations kept lowering the odds for the 164-foot space rock until Jan. 9, when NASA's Near-Earth Object (NEO) program office effectively ruled out chances of an impact.

"Mars sees these kinds of near-miss encounters every ten or twenty years, but the impact rate for asteroids this size is about once in a thousand years," said Steve Chesley, an astronomer at the Jet Propulsion Lab in Pasadena, California.

Astronomers had hoped the fleet of spacecraft orbiting Mars would get a chance to observe the asteroid plowing into the Martian surface. The subsequent crater would have roughly equaled the size of the Meteor Crater that formed in northern Arizona 50,000 years ago, with a 0.5-mile diameter. Such an impact would have also allowed scientists to study the dust cloud from the impact.

"We were hoping for a spectacular show to reveal a lot," Chesley said. "We've actually never seen a significant impact on a terrestrial planet."

Space Rock Misses Mars, Barely | LiveScience

Too bad, it would have been cool to see the impact.

Joey · 02-01-2008, 04:06 AM

Ooo... close call right there. But I know what you mean, would have been pretty cool to watch

Slim_Jesta · 02-01-2008, 10:37 PM

The information we could have collected would have been very significant to the scientific community, plus it would have been cool to see!

02-01-2008, 04:06 AM	#2
Joey Jude (duder) Law Join Date: Jan 2008 Posts: 1,309 Tokenz: 136	Re: Space Rock Misses Mars, Barely Ooo... close call right there. But I know what you mean, would have been pretty cool to watch __________________ Fly On...

02-01-2008, 10:37 PM	#3
Slim_Jesta Senior Member Join Date: Feb 2007 Location: In the house, next to Bubba-Lou-Joe Posts: 626 Tokenz: 123	Re: Space Rock Misses Mars, Barely The information we could have collected would have been very significant to the scientific community, plus it would have been cool to see! __________________

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