This has been a good test of our planetary defense procedures, and will be an even better test on the off chance the probability resolves to 100%. I'm rooting for an impact trajectory, since we'd either get to see humanity's first real asteroid deflection or witness the largest asteroid impact in over a century. (Hopefully in the ocean or a sparsely populated area!)
And hopefully it can be highly rich in rare minerals, so that when the ashes of WW3 finally settle down, at least the future generations of humans or not-human sapient entities will at least get something good out of the whole ridiculous mess we're currently in lol
Unfortunately, at the speed they travel, an asteroid will be vaporised in the impact. Whatever rare earths there are will be scatter as a fine powder over a large area.
Unfortunately, I half expect that if we get a 100% chance, governments are going to see where it's going to land (sea/Africa) and decide it's not worth the spend/let's see what happens if we let it hit.
Really hope I'm wrong, but I don't have a lot of faith in humanity anymore.
It's only a city-killer, but last I saw there were a few cities in the estimated impact area. Fortunately we'll get a better idea of whether it's going to hit in 2028. Plenty of time to launch a redirection mission or evacuate the danger zone.
The problem is that countries east of the projected impact will say that a deflection attempt will be viewed as a nuclear attack. Shit will get messy real quick.
In a new update, the space agency has increased the chances of asteroid 2024 YR4 colliding with Earth, with the probability of impact rising to 3.1 per cent or one-in-32 odds of impact — the highest probability of a collision yet.
IE - 3%.
3% events happen all of the time!
The article stresses that this probability has been going up over the past year or so, which is likely neither here nor there, but I can totally understand how it’s alarming in a post-COVID world.
Statistics isn't my strong suit. What's the probability of the probability increasing given that it has been increasing over time? Should we project the future probability to include this growth?
Really no idea personally. My hunch would be that it’s technically a fuzzy problem (what’s the system being measured here exactly?) but also one around which we have some experience and wisdom established by now. Otherwise, the probability has changed like twice or three times, so any statistical inference would likely be close to meaningless with that little data.
This is the expected path the probability is going to take. Scott Manley made a great video on that.
Basically the area in which the asteroid is going to be includes the earth. When you shrink this area earth is going to take up more space, unless it left the cone. I.e. measurements increase the likelihood until they don't.
If it falls on a joint meeting of Trump and Putin who once again decided to have a meeting to discuss Ukraine without Ukraine that should be fantastic, and not at all asking too much. Hopeful musk is hanging out with bezos and Netanyahu and Xi are talking too. Really not asking enough if you think about it