Asteroid coming?!?!?

TintDude · January 23, 2008

http://www.abovetopsecret.com/forum/thread328087/pg1
Admin Update: the account below was originally posted on the Yahoo News Message boards, but has since been removed by Yahoo management. I've recovered the posting from Google Cache to include below

Asteroid 2007 TU24 has NASA concerned. A former colleague of mine is now a contract worker for NASA who develops and maintains the software applications for the Solar System Dynamic simulator and other NASA applications. He called me last night to inform me that NASA has there full focus and attention on this asteroid. All software applications support staff have been directed to devote their time specifically to running solutions on this Near Earth Object. They are running solutions with different inputs and the results are so close to direct impact that NASA has decided not to update the online simulator with these results. When you look at the current solution online the last orbit determination parameter is from January 1, 2008. This data is 11 days old.
ssd.jpl.nasa.gov...

11 day old data for an object that has been getting closer and closer to us in each successive run is not normal protocol. Normal procedure would have the solutions posted online every two to three days at the beginning of the 30 day window which was December 29, 2007. As the window of time shrinks the data is refreshed with more frequency. The lack of refreshing the data online is suspicious and should raise some eyebrows amongst those who have intimate knowledge of how the astral community operates.

My friend, who I cannot identify, because of security issues told me that NASA is about 50/50 as to whether this asteroid will impact Earth. The dynamic variable that is in play is whether or not Earths gravity will pull the asteroid in. The trajectory angle that the asteroid is approaching from is the southern hemisphere. The solutions currently show numerous scenarios impacting Earth. The solutions that favor a Southern hemisphere impact are the most serious. These solutions are a direct straight on impact. The Northern hemisphere solutions vary widely from because there is the likelihood that the asteroid will fragment as it traverses Earths atmosphere. There is no possible way of knowing with 100% certainty how much this object will fragment if the Northern hemisphere solution pans out. The solutions that have this NEO missing Earth have it passing perilously close to satellites in orbit and the International Space Station.

This is a very fluid situation that literally changes by the minute. NASA is keeping a tight lip on the situation as they do not know with certainty what will transpire. The game plan in these situations is to avoid civil unrest and end of day’s paranoia. This is to ensure that the privileged class can make it easily to their safe havens, which are underground bunkers.

If you are praying man or woman I suggest to you that your prayers are directed toward the protection of Earth from this object. If you are not a praying person I suggest to you that you become one. May the Great Spirit protect us all!

Here's the Addy to the NASA page showing the trajectory
http://ssd.jpl.nasa.gov/sbdb.cgi?sstr=2007%20TU24;orb=1

:rollin :thumb :rollin

January 23, 2008

Don't worry, Chuck Norris will take care of it for us. :rollin

TintDude · January 23, 2008

I just ran the simulator at jpl.nasa...looks like this thing is coming in on the 28/29th, I can't find anything on it's size yet. Buckle up people.

tintgoeroe · January 23, 2008

January 23, 2008

Good find Ric :rollin

150 to 600 meters About the size of a walmart :rollin

Don Yeomans

NASA/JPL Near-Earth Object Program Office

January 22, 2008

Asteroid 2007 TU24, discovered by the Catalina Sky Survey on October 11, 2007 will closely approach the Earth to within 1.4 lunar distances (334,000 miles) on 2008 Jan. 29 08:33 UT. This object, between 150 and 600 meters in diameter, will reach an approximate apparent magnitude 10.3 on Jan. 29-30 before quickly becoming fainter as it moves further from Earth. For a brief time the asteroid will be observable in dark and clear skies with amateur telescopes of 3 inch apertures or larger.

January 23, 2008

I just ran the simulator at jpl.nasa...looks like this thing is coming in on the 28/29th, I can't find anything on it's size yet. Buckle up people.

Good, I will be out of town on the 28th & 29th. :rollin :rollin

January 24, 2008

here is a tidbit about it from the frenchies

Asteroid to give Earth a close shave next week

by Staff Writers

Paris (AFP) Jan 23, 2008

A huge asteroid will zoom past Earth next week at such a close distance that amateur astronomers should be able to spot it, specialists said on Wednesday.

Measuring between 150 and 600 metres (yards) across, asteroid 2007 TU24 would inflict devastating regional damage were it to hit Earth, but there is no risk of any collision, they said.

It will fly by on Tuesday, being around 534,000 kilometres (334,000 miles) from the Earth at its closest point at 0834 GMT, according to a Near Earth Object (NEO) database compiled by the University of Pisa in Italy.

"For a brief time the asteroid will be observable in dark and clear skies with amateur telescopes of three inches (7.5 centimetres) or larger," NASA said on its NEO site (http://neo.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news157.html).

2007 TU24 will make the closest approach of any known potentially hazardous asteroid of this size or larger until 2027, NASA said, adding that objects of this size come close to Earth about every five years or so on average.

The rock was discovered only last October under a surveillance programme run by the University of Arizona.

According to the Minor Planet Center of the Paris-based International Astronomical Union (IAU), the closest detected approach by an asteroid was on March 31, 2004 by 2004 FU162, which came within 6,500 kms (4,000 miles) of Earth.

The day after 2007 TU24's terrestrial flyby, asteroid 2007 WD5 is expected to come within 26,000 kms (16,250 miles) of Mars, a distance that is less than a whisker in space terms.

2007 WD5 ignited a brief surge of excitement among astronomers after it was discovered in November.

Initial computations of its orbit gave a roughly 1-in-25 chance that it might whack into Mars on January 30, providing a celestial show that could be monitored by US and European scoutcraft there.

Measuring about 50 metres (165 feet) across, it would have delivered an impact equivalent to a three-megatonne nuclear weapon. A rock of this size exploded over Tunguska, Siberia, in 1908, felling around 80 million trees over 2,200 square kms (850 square miles).

But further calculation showed that the hoped-for big splat would be a big miss.

"It's highly unlikely that it's going to hit," said NEO expert Benny Peiser of Liverpool John Moores University in northwestern England, as the odds of a collision by 2007 WD5 fell to around 0.01 percent, or one in 10,000