Earth Unprepared for Comet or Asteroid Strike, Says NASA Scientist

Photograph: Mopic / Alamy/Alamy

The Earth is almost completely defenseless against a collision with an errant comet or asteroid, says one NASA scientist.  The frightening findings were delivered on Monday by Dr Joseph Nuth, a researcher with Nasa’s Goddard Space Flight Center, at a presentation with nuclear scientists into how humans might deflect cosmic dangers hurtling toward Earth.

“The biggest problem, basically, is there’s not a hell of a lot we can do about it at the moment," said the NASA scientist

Dr. Nuth cites the five year period it takes to get a rocket into space as the main problem with our current defenses, since the most recent "close call" occurred in 2014 when a comet passed “within cosmic spitting distance of Mars," but was only discovered 22 months prior to its near collision.  

He recommends keeping a prepared rocket in storage, in order to "mitigate the possibility of a sneaky asteroid coming in from a place that’s hard to observe, like from the sun."

Source: The Guardian