Thank you for the update, Ron. I REALLY want a banging-head-against-the-wall smiley for instances like this. An astronomer(s) find(s) a new asteroid that MAY have an orbit that is Earth-crossing. Immediately, the press runs amok with the data and screams "Doomsday!" before waiting for more information. Not to mention every nutbar who is 'talking with the aliens/spirits/God' and channeling their pet delusions. For the people who are actually searching for real asteroid threats, this sort of fearmongering is more dangerous than a potential impactor, because the public gets desensitized. At least MSN got it right with the Torino scale, but the rest was sensationalism.
Tracy Latimer
From: Ron Baalke <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Meteorite Mailing List) Subject: Re: [meteorite-list] New Asteroid Threat Seen (Asteroid 2003 QQ47) Date: Tue, 2 Sep 2003 15:42:06 -0700 (PDT)
LINEAR obtained some new observations of the asteroid today, which extends
the data arc from 6.7 days to 9 days. We've just computed a new orbit solution, and
2003 QQ47 has dropped to Torino 0. Also, the number of potential impacts
have been reduced from 31 to 18, and the 2014 potential impact
has been eliminated.
http://neo.jpl.nasa.gov/risk
Ron Baalke
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