2009 IAA Planetary Defense Conference: Day 3 (Session 4)
Keynote
Impacts, Catastrophism and Technological Capability to Other Areas of Endeavor
Oliver Morton (Chief News and Features Editor, Nature, London, UK)
Been to previous planetary defense conferences (in 2004), “Ways to see the world, ways to save the world: NEO awareness and mitigation in context”
Look at things in a broader context, “encounters with asteroids alter perspectives” Skhizein – Jeremy Clapin – about a man who gets hits by a meteorite – ends up standing 72cm to the right of the real world, goes to the psychologist (10 minutes long), illustrates the main them, tend to think in blockbuster terms – useful to think about a small scale – this Endeavour is also quirky and small scale – absolutely fascinating, all scientists talk about problem, you have had an extremely successful three decade success story – increased scientific understanding – the process may not have not been best sure, acceptance of K-T event, image from Nature of various experts, much to do – need more money, need a better policy framework, look at the broader shifts in people’s perceptions, elements of success: the “astronomer’s gaze” - sees farther and more than anyone else and the way they see if more divorced from touching than is any other form of vision (general way of science sees the universe) – there is second scientific realm that astronomer has privileged access to (fundamentally other) – meditated by telescopes, Hubble deep field – total perspective that disaggregates perceptive – Irish telescope (telescope) – made during the Irish famine, colleague’s book “Captured by Aliens” (book) – whole chapter of the Eagle nebula – the majesty began to fade – does the mean exist only because we insert it into the frame, what does it mean? “Comets not longer frighten the public – this is a results which science certainly has the right to congratulate itself, “astronomers should leave to astrologers the task of seeking the cause of earthly events in the star (NYTimes), overturning the astronomer’s gaze, reintroduction of the catastrophe, “100 Suns/ Full Moon” images, Lucifer’s hammer – thriller by Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle – obvious to naturalize nuclear war – this is not limited to nuclear war – to some extent it says that civilization has already ended (fear of Charles Manson) – sense of something has gone wrong – disturbing power – brings together anxieties, Matthew Paris – the sublime – being in the presence of the dangerous – what is think about massive destruction – Indian Ocean tsunami – “relished” those numbers – auctioneer of calamity, also its humorous aspects, “Dead Like Me” – first episode – hit by falling lavatory seat from a disused Russian space station, next topic: planetary perspective: the world we experience is objectively a planet, other planet got his regularly – drove debate about earth, way of seeing mediated by spacecraft, quote from Rusty about the planetary perspective, place within a context, element of success (“long zoom” – Steve Johnson) – most periods have ways of seeing (MTV cuts, renaissance, etc.), this period have long zoom (fractals, Google Earth, social movements, difficult way of thinking) – brains did not evolve to understand the scale – Powers of Ten, the mediation is the computer – could think the computer is alienating, images from his presentation came from “Contact” when talking about the long zoom – when you pull al the way is a person’s eye – provides a continuity, once you expand your notion to include a cell phone, 2008 TC3 is the long zoom – astronomer’s gaze to truly personal, the way the world thinks about this, what we do makes it seem much more normal – scientific and cultural normalization, “you don’t have to try as hard” these days as much – “relax” – you are broadly doing what you want – a humped has been crossed, normalization into planning, sense of continuity (Hayabusa at Itokawa to Orion CEV at asteroid), twitter feed (low flying rocks) – when an asteroid passes by the earth’s orbit – thousands of people get that by mobile phone, hard to remember live in a science fictional world, normalization into research (MRO image of mid-latitude of Mars, few impact craters formed since MRO when into orbit, imager can use impacts in near real time for science, white stuff is ice), people looking at planets, the case for Mars impacts – the best use of asteroid deflection is to allow access to and sampling on substance, allow unusual access but astrobiotoically extremely relevant conditions, allow experiment with precision guidance of asteroid, prediction: there will be a deliberate impacts on Mars before there is a deflection away from Mars, Lessons for elsewhere – NEOS and their mitigation provide something like a toy model for other issues of governance, in particular there are lessons here for people trying to protect fht world from photons as well as from rocks,
Similarities between impact mitigation and geoengineering (massive potential risk, good public arguments, fringe issue, tainted with science fiction, resistance from mainstream, resistance from civil society, accidents, dramatic natural demonstration – SL9 / Mt. Pinatubo – both are examples – Spaceguard report in 1990s / NRC report) – big advantage – not part of a large serious policy debate – episodes of intense media coverage pumped by real world events, focus on small scale detection work of semi scientific type, slightly retiring risk, low level by real level political support, lobbying with specific claims, technological piggybacking, integration into normal science, changes to conceptual framework (tsunamis, keyholes, gravity tugs), the asteroid impact mitigation community has been the scene of significant arguments and disagreement, some established norms, changed its mind about things, the same time it has made process, moving between scales all seem more real, “clumsy” solutions – it is quite something to learn from the sublime – great achievement,
Session 4 Neo Impacts & Consequences
Session Chairs: David Morrison, Al Harris
Announcement of poster papers
Two posters associated with this session
- Trigo-Rodriguez (“The Impact of NEOs and their fragments recorded from the ground…”), Spanish fireball network, trakcing bright fireballs, 2002NY40 case (discovered in 2006 by network), trajectory and orbital information about daylight bodies, in 2006 obtained ninth orbit of a meteorite in the solar system Villalbto fall), Puetro Lapice (May 10 2007) – bolide object, 30cm sized meteoroid, Bejar superbolide (11-7-2008), brightest event in network, more than 1 meter in diameter entering, disruption of C/1919Q2 Metcalf comet (ended at height of 22 km altitude),
- Ferrier, et al (“Atmospheric entry of Apophis: A preliminary study”) atmospheric has a general protective effect on Apophis entry, Apophis could face heavy fragmentation (for slope around 20 degrees) leading to smaller fragment significantly slower and lighter than the initial object, ablation will deeply influence the final mass of Apophis fragments (final total mass from 0.01% to 40% of the total mass), for skimming (and rarest angles) Apophis could skip and eventually leave the atmosphere
- Alan Harris comment: many times we have been caught in general cases, sometimes many small things could do ground damage, need to address dispersion outcome of entry speeds (100m object may not get to ground, few meters across object could get to the ground)
- The Nature of Airbursts and their Contribution to the Impact Threat
Mark Boslough (Sandia National Laboratory, United States)
First part describe airbursts, in the past when we model airburst we made oversimplifications, still simplifying but making fewer simplifying assumptions, more complicated phenomena, have not done a complete quantitative analysis – greater then we thought, relative threat from LAA (Low Altitude Airbursts) is increasing, most of the integrated threat is from the large objects, 100 m / 100 Mt has 1/100 chance in century (100-100-100 event, every 10K years) – will dominate threat once 90% of object larger than 140 m, the next destructive NEO is virtually certain (greater than 99% chance), to be LAA, IPP on Climate Change defining verbally descriptive terms, less than 200 m in diameter dominated by air burst, tech development similar to threat reduction time, other reasons to deflect and fragment small asteroids (for resources and possibility for GEO engineering), put one of these in L1 point and dust (could reduce number of photons), mitigation should focus on small ones (~100 meters ) – could just be civil defense, Al Harris iconic plot – plot of the long zoom, LAAs are not explosions (unlike bombs – point source), generate upward ballistic plumes (saw in 1994 from SL9), generate downward vortex rings (smoke rings that carry a lot of energy), enhance heat transport to surface – even as KE is lost – momentum still continues - unlike bomb, carries mechanical energy downward, anisotropic radiation patterns, two types of LAA, Tunguska type – fireball descends rapidly but does not reach the ground – expands – enough surface - shockwave to surface, area to start losing energy, 1-10Mt (1908), Libyan Desert Glass (29 M years ago), fireball is much larger and descends all the way to the surface, threshold yield is about 10 Mt, its own inertia tends to expand on ground – trees would vaporize, was at 100th anniversary, no evidence of glass in Tunguska, most of the Tunguska damage is mechanical, slope angle of 35% (like Tunguska), treefall at 50 m/s, threshold is less if terrain is not flat and trees not healthy (5 mt explosions at 12 km abouve surface at 35 degrees angle), for type 2, consequences, get stationary wind at bottom at epicenter (fireball), cannot make this not happen for 15 MT explosion, Pancake model (Chyba, et al, in 1993) – revisited – vortex at surface (2-d potential effect, maybe at 3d would break up), previous Tunguska yield estimates were too high, moemetum coupling to atmosphere t, solid, earthm and tsunami amy be higher, ,Type 2 airbusrst could generate fireablls in co=nat with surface over hundred of square kilomtters fo tens of seconds (possibility ti ifind more evidence in the geological record).
K.H.: association with velocity, M.B.: 15km/s, if you had time and computational time then you could examine multiple parameter space
- Every Threatening Asteroid an Apophis
Lu, E.T. (B612 Foundation, United States)
Presented by Rusty in place of Ed, fundamental point that Ed wanted to put across – Apophis at keyhole, every deflection will involve an Apophis case, primary deflection = miss the Earth, as soon as move it away from the Earth, all along the LOV are keyhole for future impacts, total impulse for Apophis (beta = 2-10), because of uncertainty then many potential keyhole, after primary deflection, next step after primary is to determine if there is secondary deflection, shepherding = guiding between keyholes, targeting JPL/N612 GT targeting, where do you want to move it? Not going to show that there is preference but…there is an Earth in there, either you take it off to either side of the Earth – geopolitical of which direction you go in terms of movement – that issue may determine which way you go or determined by cheapest way if it is near one edge..perhaps you look at where you want to come back, the question you have to ask If you we are going to take the responsibility then where do we want to put it and why – the philosophy and criteria of targeting – begin thinking about, what you can do is run a sequence – develop a long term plan for any asteroid – not just a one time thing but what do you want to do with it – a long term plan that includes that pumps up through a series of gravitational pulses, pumping up aphelion after 80 year (5 deflections) and end up with aphelion out to hill radius , convert it to a non NEO, or use gravitational force of Mars of Venus, the concept here is primary deflection and a capability to trim (this is Rusty’s point), Ed’s point: 60-65% of cases over time have future approaches, means it is important to measure after deflection,
- The Carancas Event: a Recent Hypervelocity Impact Crater in the Altiplano
Tancredi, G.1; Ishitsuka, J.2; Schultz, P.3; Harris, S.3; Brown, P.4; ReVelle, D.51Fac. Ciencias (Montevideo); 2Instituto Geofísico del Peru (Montevideo); 3Dept. Geological Sciences, Brown University (United States); 4Dept. of Physics and Astronomy, University of Western Ontario (Canada); 5Meteorological Modeling Team, Los Alamos National Laboratory (United States)
List of distribution of attendees to PDC 2009, need more diversity perhaps, Lindley Johnson stated “that a 2-5 m meteoroid would oinly create a fireball” – this event challenges the view, close to many borders (Chile/Bolivia/Peru), the witnesses (people said that cloud of dust, and animals), photo of smoke trail, crater – diameter of 14m, almost immediately filled with underground water, Sept. 15, 2007 11:45 LT fireball was observed, explosion was observed, several pieces of material was collected, several people claimed to be sick, many seismic stations that were able to detect event, first seismic detection of an extraterrestrial impact on Earth (47 km away), estimate of orbit from data, carancas meteorites, ordinary chondrite type H4/5 (stony), hit on dry riverbed, 13.5 m crater, depth of 2.5 m, meteorite fragments in soil, quartz grains with shock metamorphism due to impact, impact velocity was >3km.s and possibly on the order of 3 – 6 km/s (based upon petrology studies and pressures on samples), size of less than one meter in size, 1-3 tons of TNT impact energy, shed that was knocked by material, 100 m away a man was turned down (but no ear drum effects), bull has one horn that is turned down because bull fell down, why is this so relevant> a fresh impact, impact crater, impact at high altitude, ordinary chondrite, seismic data, material from ground, usual picture is that a 1 ton stony meteorite producing a 14 m crater is not possible according to previous studies, initial mass was 7-12 tons, 1-6-2 m (initial velocity, 12-17 km/s, impact was 3-6km/s), seismic efficiency: 10^-3, heath problems were exaggerated, about 8 2 m meteorites per year, paper to appear in ACM issue in MAPS, rejected from nature, very few samples of the meteorite – many taken by local people,
Dearborn: said that look at the approach angle, shallow approach angle have a longer time – less ablation, angle was order of 50-60 degrees
- Near-Field Effects of Asteroid Impacts in Deep Water
Gisler, G.1; Weaver, R.2 1University of Oslo (Norway); 2Los Alamos National Laboratory (United States)
Only a few impact craters under 5km of water, all undersea craters are on the continental shelf, as asteroid has to be very big to make a crater on the seafloor, only get up to 1km diameter to get effect, tsunami deposits might be sign of deep water impacts, debate within the community about finding these (community does not fully accept this evidence), do deep water impacts make tsunamis at all, started in 2002 testing out new computer at Los Alamos, collapse of that jet that makes the tsunami wave, transient crates made usually probably asymmetrically, evolution after that is relatively symmetric, wave that is generated is surprisingly ineffective, the wave breaks in mid-ocean (high amplitude, regular tsunami has a low amplitude – propagates as shallow wave) – 1 km wave that breaks in mid-ocean – does not propagate very well, the newest simulations therefore study mostly near field effects and sediment transport, done with code called Sage (written by SAIC adopted by Los Alamos), 1000 m impact into 5km of water, 1 km sediment, basalt crust, did various trades of various diameters, resultant wave is only factor of 2 larger than transient crater, 1km (477 m at 30 km, 17 m at 2000 km), 100 m (37m at 30km, 1.3 m at 2000 km), less than 10 m for those asteroid less than 500 m, asteroid tsunamis do not resemble classical tsunamis, landslide case – extremely regular particles, asteroid impact: more chaotic interaction – more possible for energy to escape, could wish we could use another term for asteroid impact tsunamis, more of the asteroid’s kinetic energy goes into vaporizing water – then a lot less energy for tsunami, near field effects extend to tens of km away from impact site, smaller impacts are in fact comparable to sever topical storms, NOAA : a hurricane dissipates on order to 0.7 GT per day (Katrina storm surge was around 8m), 500 m dividing line, deflect asteroid greater than 500m if landing in the middle of the ocean, less smaller ones fall into the sea, if near a populated coastline, Mark and Gisler will attempt to do an airburst combined analysis, if in open sea, monitor wave and use for checking the code (“mad scientist”)
Question: depends on depth of water, shallow water issue, shallow water case interesting – the only case known that tsunami from impact is KT impact, slumps from the shaking caused tsunami, need to run shallow water cases
Question: Most of calculations are 2-D, a 3-D calculation would able to run largest computer (calc. would take a week).
- Insurance and Meteors Fall: Proposal of a Methodology for Estimating the Risk and Modeling
Consequences for the Insurance Sector in France
Garbolino, E.1; Michel, P.2; Holsapple, K.3 1Ecole des Mines de Paris (France); 2National Center for Scientific Research (France); 3University of Washington (United States)
Geographer from France, a year ago insurance company told to assess portfolio to meteor impact, meteor falls are usually considered as too improbable, need to answer the cost of damage and the vulnerability of insurance portfolio, damage assessment is a key activity, interdisciplinary approach, (technical, stakes, and cost). Territorial vulnerability (sensibility) = function (intensity, probability of occurrence, sensitivity of the stakes, intrinsic resilience, resilience to return to prior state, spatial decision support system, case study of French Rivera (Nice, 350 k inhabitants), tourist infrastructures, many ERP (establishment serving public), 4 scenarios (1m 10, 30, 50 m asteroid), airblast destroys building (small end is pushing model – clearly improvement, simple analogy taking nuclear airblast without, S 1 (6 k people, $426 M total cost) 30-50 m asteroid would destroy Nice (350 k people, $30B Euro), possible that insurance companies would be interested in covering this type of event, SDSS could be taken for emergency services,
D. ML: we do a danger talking about 6 meter objects, we create a bad false impression of risk,
C. Chapman: approach is valid approach, but the closer link between the this analysis and the actual effects of NEOs, this simple data is too simple misrepresents, get that link correct
Rusty: feel free what insurance company name – la Maif – national insurance company,
Clark Chapman: terminology, too late for NEO (should say N + E + O), meteor strikes – term,
J. Michel: demonstration of approach this
Perhaps look at equivalent events such as those that have been mentioned
- Estimating the NEO Population and Impact Risk: Past, Present and Future
Al Harris; Space Science Institute (United States)
Revised impact Kill Curve (airbursts and small land impacts, impact generated tsunami), short term warning – death plunge, probably only one out there in several km in diameter, largest size range – residual risk resides in fractional probability that one such body has not been found (not counting comets), seen that these things come in different speeds (smaller objects or larger objects going slower may delivery more energy to ground than average) – deal with dispersion of characteristics, revised kill curve published initially in 1993 – claim is that we have underestimated airburst (previous enhancements were nuclear airburst which are explosions with no momentum), Hills and Goda damage was 30 MT for Tunguska (too high), Mark suggestion as low as 3 MT (Alan Harris thinking 7.5 MT), revised kill curve, 4 times less massive body same as previous estimate, Revised kill curve for tsunami (adopted what Steve Ward/Chesley/Harris estimated run up, in report for 2002/2003 at the end of the calculation assumed that even thought only 10% of fatalities would die / the number of people affected could be used as property damage (value of Net Worth of Human, $1M/person, actual infrastructure is a factor of 10 down from cost/person), argue that tsunami damage is perhaps overdone – should based upon lives lost, elephant in the corner are the large ones (revisions make little difference for the large objects), 0.1-1km revised curve lower fatalities per year, less change to worry about in the small area, small things for surveys to find that remaining action, surveying for asteroids is like fishing (get what you get, the impact hazard in perceptive: when we get to next generation surveys (comets started getting to larger portion of threat), we have discovered half the objects the size of Apophis (next generation survey will generate Apophis – but not as many as feared), not going to be worried about Apophis, the survey is 84% complete to 1km, 95% complete to 2km, only a small fraction of Tunguska size NEAs have been found, next generation durvey should find 25% of objects that pose ground impact, short term warning – TC3 event – 20% chance to look at right part of sky, 10% chance of catching Tc3 event with current survey (found one after decade of survey is not surprising), in principle LSST may see things on a monthly basis (but no follow-up), worried about impact hazard – the next generation survey will find anything that make to the ground – LSST will pick things pick more than one month in advance (the nest you can do is 35% since you are not watching the other part)
Global impact events: 1 km was selected as lower limit where you could believe you have global effects, 1 km object = largest volcanic event (similar)
D. M: goal is 90% of 140, but that includes more as well
- Casualty and Fatality Rates of Massive Extinction After Asteroid Impact with Earth
Ortega, G.1; Bavandi, A.1; Weikert, S.2; Giron Sierra, J.M.3; Laurel, C.4 1ESA (Netherlands); 2ASTOS Solutions GmbH (Germany); 3University of Madrid (Spain); 4Periapsis Visual Software (United States)
Job is compute optimal trajectories at ESA, earth catastrophic event more than 10,000 people killed at same time, Maximum Probable Loss (MPL): greatest financial amount of loss from previously defined event, used ATOS tool (included DARS – debris analysis re-rentry spacecraft), also included DIA (debris impact analysis) and RAM (risk analysis) , parametric analysis of various asteroid sizes, formula for impact, various simulations of various cities, risk of impact is larges than 1 in a million risk of death use in ESA terms
Panel Sessions:
M. Boslough: One of the ways that Tunguska was overestimated, momentum would carry fireball all the way to the surface if using older numbers, look at the intensity of the shock wave from a nuclear explosion you get more danage then you see at Tunguska, concluded that it may be a smaller energy (3-5 MT may be 1 in 1000 year event) but also less frequency (larger events where getting to be implausible)
A. Harris: 300-500 year event for Tunguska, the population has dropped by a factor of 2-3 and energy has also dropped
A Harris (the younger): One phenomena about electromagnetic pulse and whether we would expect that and waht sort of size?
M. Boslough: observationally there was an E-mag pulse effects for Tunguska and SL9 impacts , you will get a plume (1000 km high for Tunguska) - different process for EM pulse, small scale events have caused transmission lines to fail, ionization effects can be part of the hazard - something that we would not want to ignore
Dearborn: scaling nuclear by yield for EMP, can see EMP in conventional explosives, have looked at EMP increase for conventional explosive, trying to get someone in his lab to look at it (for other reasons)
K.H.: want to focus on Hill and Goga approach...most of the energy goes into ground, Hills and Goga may overestimate using nuclear blast data for ground effects
A. Harris: Jack Hills fan of tsunamis - made the assumption that even a 100 m object (crate damage), curves at top may be not correct,
D. Morrison: blast wave for large object may not be that important
J. Michel: point out that everyone is making models, rate of numbers for phenomena, resolution for modeling is higher than what can be done, what are the things that are uncertain
A. Harris: Mark B. did a poster at AGU (from disaster movies), had in the last few year (asteroids actually hitting something, Peru and Sudan) - we do not see disaster movies, forget the world is very empty place, highly unlikely
M. Boslough: started with disclaimer - qualitative outputs are what are important, done the next level of analysis, point source - now point source with momentum, does not include viscosity / only 2-D, a good fluid dynamics simulation, how to calibrate: airbursts happen more often
Oliver: catastrophic interpretation of cities, chances of hitting cities are small, ways to have maps for blast area of Tunguska (compared to cities), guard against,
A. Harris: Chance of Tunguska hitting your town about the same as you drowning in toilet
R. S.: Political decision makers will mis-perceive and worst case will be the perception of impact
Gisler: calibrate codes with smaller events and tsunamis in the past, "perhaps of computing is insight and numbers" look at smaller events, Van Doren effect – based on results of underwater nuclear tests, these waves are similar to impact tsunami waves, small asteroid impacts in water (are dangerous on a local basis), if something were to provide 2004 tsunami event (that is still far short of global catastrophe),
A Harris: looked at various different historical report, the integral of all reports multiplied by credibility is greater than one, cars/mailboxes, by all odds someone should have been killed in the last century
Audience member: Source says 190 from (John Lewis book) last century killed
Tancredi: Terrestrial material on the side indicated that impact parameters
2009 IAA Planetary Defense Conference: Day 3 (Session 5)
Session 5 Policy, Preparedness, Deciding to Act
Session Chairs: Andres Galvez, A.C. Charania
- Report on University of Nebraska-Lincoln Conference "Near-Earth Objects: Risks, Responses and Opportunities–Legal Aspects"
Frans von der Dunk (University of Nebraska-Lincoln, United States)
"ASE NEO Committee report: Asteroid Threats: A Call for Global Response," report came to three conclusions: there is a capacity to detect / a capacity to act / missing of international decision making structure, risks not distributed in propositional to capabilities (Sudan and Peru not space fairing nations), risks not proportional to costs, who is going to pay, these are places where the law comes in, report delivered in Sept. 2008 briefing of key UN players and major states, Action Team 14 within the UN structure, what is the role of the legal subcommittee of COPUOS?, have three groups and UN Sec. council has three “groups” underneath (specific groups of functions), US Sec. Council to mandate whatever happens in a specific concept of deflection, UNL conference: setting the scene / legal/political aspects / international legal aspects and exploring NEOs and domestic US laws of NEO, and intergovernmental panel on Legal and Policy Aspects of NEO response activities (every continent representative), role of the military in various scenarios, liability (for not reporting, for not deflecting, for not being successfully, past incident with NOAA lawsuit about Indian Ocean tsunami information being withheld), what is asteroid is coming to N. Korea and US does nothing about it, liability convention (current legal regime), should we establish cross-waiver (like the ISS IGA- but that is between parties), good Samaritan, second major legal issue is international humanitarian responsibilities (obligation of provision of relevant information) - perhaps an institutional framework (builds trust) – parameters for action before actual case arises, obligation of protection of fundamental human rights, property issues (with a view to private involvement, current legal regime is unclear, ownership of minerals versus entire body, pressing need to make sure international and legal aspects do not get lost, need to further analyze legal issues, website: spaceandteleconlaw.unl.edu.conference./neopowerpoints
M. Boslough: telescope on asteroid – does it matter if you land the asteroid about who owns it?
von der Dunk: How about owning the mineralogical rights: IP: that exists in outer space, the problem arrive in moment when you extend the ownership to the mineral, one exception with risk to mankind – if you get information on might hit the risk to Earth you should share, composition for commercial purposes should be protected
- NEO Mitigation and Coordination with the Disaster Management Community
Chapman, C.; Schweickart, R. (B612 Foundation, United States)
Doubt if something were to happen there would be a broad based knowledge within the U.S. or globally would know how they would respond, need to respond between astronomers and others is more urgent, address the power law (small ones happen much more often that big events) – crucial thing for a practical perspective – smallest predictive impacts that might be dangerous (Skylab – re-entry was worldwide news), past PDCs have examined far larger NEOs than most likely, for every Apophis more than 50 Tunguskas, what is the smallest NEO that is dangerous – vital issue (if it is too small they will not care, metallic objects are dangerous but rare), SDT report in 2003 thought 50 m, Boslough suggest 30-40m, should we be unconcerned about 25 m object, Al Harris chart is not diameter but have an H value (uncertainty a nominal 25 m body may be 50 m in diameter), short term warning – the new reality, better than 1 chance in 3 that the Spaceguard will provide short term warning (few weeks) during the current decade, TC3 teaches us that we have an early warning system – rethink communication channels, 2008 TC3 : 4 m asteroid (an annual impact on Earth) – astronomers have overlooked short term Spaceguard survey, current survey will find 35% of NEAs > 30m on final plunge, will find more on final plunge than one long in advance, public officials must make decisions much more often than NEOs will actually hit, case of marginal impact scenarios, virtual impactor search (JPL impact page shows low probability impacts – cannot be observed before final plunge) – search for these virtual impactors weeks prior to impact – if coming from the Sun, radar would be required, we have risk corridors, some semi-serious is impact predictions that require analysis leading to no action, short term impact warning, mentioned short term warning , look at ASE recommendations
- Near-Earth Objects within the European Space Situational Awareness Programme
Koschny, D.1; Bobrinsky, N.2; del Monte, L.3
1ESA/ESTEC (Netherlands); 2ESA/ESOC (Germany); 3ESA/HQ (France)
Objective of SSA programme declaring: environment, threats, and the sustainable exploitation of outer space (three segments: space debris, space weather, NEOs, later: imaging), most of the effort is in space debris, in Nov. 2008 – preparatory phase started, last for 10 years after this phase, what does it consist of: network of sensors (ground and space-based), data centers, common data policy, optical programme, not a science driven needs, science needed to do program, do not have to justify by scientific nature, shall issue impact warnings, customers and users (replace decision makers with government, insurance companies want to make sure it is low risk, a customer as one who pays), NEO Data centre (not one place – distributed amongst many countries in ESA), status: write a customer requirements document – will be written in the next few weeks, start creating a European network of sensors (Intelsat will pay for orbital debris information), set up prototype service until 2009, just finished ESA external document,
- Results of Multi-Agency Deflection and Disaster Exercise
Garretson, P.1; Johnson, L.2
1Council on Foreign Relations (United States); 2NASA/HQ (United States)
New report is a summary of events, a simulation was performed of a short term days) and long term (years) impact scenario with members fro various US government military and civilian agencies, a new report is out that outlines results, it is not an official position of the USG or any of the agencies involved, it would help into insight into real decision making, has done previous work with the USAF Future Concepts office (including backcasting analysis), why event held? Look at high catastrophe events with high consequence, a letter from NASA HQ was secured to help obtain momentum for event, most people in simulation, “if not us, who? Would do such a simulation game, initially participants may have thought this would have a sci-fi nature to the event, 27 people plus 3 offsite participated in the event, multiple agencies- maybe OSTP in the future, most agency role players felt the responsibility for planetary defense against PHO was someone else’s responsibility, attendees were mostly action officers from their various organizations, looking for the richest (but perhaps not most probable scenario), called 2008 Innoculatus, Lindley J./Mark B./Mark ) in room, went for the broadest swath of people, two groups looking at different threats (same people, consecutive scenarios), first threat was 72 hours from impact (lost 10 hours getting ready in simulation), 50 m metallic body headed for D.C. area, 270 m rubble pile hitting the Nigerian Coast, missing some key people (namely state and local planner), one of the issues is that the error ellipse for impact is so broad – emergency response it is difficult to optimize, scenarios basically made 2029 today, future planning scenarios may be less ambitious, insights: NEO plans not captured in existing plans, NASA does have some sort of a contingency process – other agencies do not, need for more senior players potentially (not too senior), most people did not laugh or giggle – there was a feeling that “I need to need to tell the boss about this,” very complex – overlapping nature of problem, need for documentation, no consensus achieved on responsibility – argued it was “the other guy” – some consensus that ground response was DHS perhaps, some felt the response would be similar to a Manhattan project with all resources ay disposal, software tools deficit to support decision make and communicate information, need for a federated systems – end estate would be a turn-key model that accepts the best data, turnkey mission planning and modeling, significant effects not captured, public may be aware before senior decision makers, limited time for evacuation decision before best information will be available, architecture for short warning time, public safety requires federal government, preferred approach for short notice scenario was stand-off nuclear (for the 7 year scenario felt there was a need for maturation, not for future scenario planners – some players though tools/simulations were distracting, next time include all agencies, media/press could be useful, NSC added, use higher level representations
- The Need to Match Action with Legislation: Some Inconsistencies in the OST
Azcarraga Arana, A.1; Gonzalez Ferreiro, E.2
1Sener Ingeniería Y Sistemas (Spain); 2Cede (Centro Español De Derecho Espacial) (Spain)
How to bring together experts in all areas (science/engineering + policy): financial crisis + climatic change, if you are able to detect something in diameter, everything has been in the military – nothing is wrong with that, example of Russian anti-submarine cruiser for Black sea (since aircraft carriers are forbidden), solve problem and not give artificial names, need for global international coordination, Galileo example is not a good example, new international body – as soon as one member asks for action – take action, look at the OST and start changing it immediately, afraid next COPUOS meeting not a clear sense of urgency there, need more media papers, change the word NEO, use PHO, don’t let things go to manana,
Panel Discussion:
No comments:
Post a Comment