This (asteroid) too shall pass
6 Mar 2009, 0127 hrs IST, Mukul Sharma, ET Bureau
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Text:
A R Rahman’s double Oscar win at the Academy Awards this year in
recognition of his professional excellence was, arguably, the high point of
the composer-musician’s career. Probably even his life. Ironically, though,
he might not have lived to see it. Two days earlier while rehearsing for the
ceremony a massive chandelier covering a large part of the ceiling came
crashing down just seconds after the maestro had moved away from the spot
directly underneath it. According to Rahman, he felt it was a warning not to
take any of the good things happening to him too seriously. “If I hadn’t
moved away,” he said, “I’d have become history in no time at all.”
So too would have St Petersburg on June 30, 1908 if it hadn’t been for the
movement of Earth. Because on that day, about 8,000 kilometres away in the
central Siberian region of Tunguska, a large meteorite or comet exploded on
impacting the atmosphere. The blast, which was about 1,000 times more
powerful than the Hiroshima bomb, felled an estimated 80 million trees over
2,150 square kilometres and caused an earthquake measuring 5.0 on the
Richter scale. However, due to Earth’s rotation, St Petersburg was out of
harm’s way. Meaning, if the impact had occurred just four hours 47 minutes
later, it would have completely destroyed the Imperial Russian capital. A
little later still, and chaos and destruction would have reigned in densely
populated Europe.
Scientists say the chances of a similar near-Earth object hitting the planet
in the future is absolutely possible and fairly high. Last week, for
instance, we dodged a bullet when asteroid 2009 DD45 passed within 70,000
kilometres of our planet — a hair’s breadth on a galactic scale. In the past
also several such collisions have occurred. Long before the dinosaurs ever
lived, the planet experienced a mass extinction event — called the Great
Dying — that was so severe it killed 90% of all life on Earth.
The 21st century is undoubtedly the high point of our civilisation’s
technology and many other fields of human endeavour. At the same time there
are about a thousand kilometre-wide near-Earth objects up there that can
unexpectedly fall out of the sky with catastrophic consequences. Perhaps
there’s a warning here for all of us that we shouldn’t take our achievements
too seriously either. Or as Rahman said in hindsight: “With the good came
the rude reminder of how quickly it can all be snatched away.”
http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/Cosmic-Uplink/This-asteroid-too-shall-pass/articleshow/4231176.cms
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regards,
Vithur
