Scientists at NASA, the European Space Agency, Roscosmos (the Russian Federation Space Agency), and other groups from around the world issued a devastating alert today.
Asteroids are heading toward Earth and will impact the planet's surface within the next week. The scientists urged the world's people to remain calm. "This is not," NASA spokesperson Jessylyn Roswin stressed, "an extinction-causing event. There will be wide devastation across the planet, but," the visibly shaken spokesperson affirmed, "we will survive."
The asteroids currently on a collision course with Earth are the product, scientists explained, of a "galactic game of billiards" one scientist said. Another noted that the analogy was more akin to a game of solar-system-wide pinball.
NASA's "Deep Impact" comet probe slammed into comet Tempel 1 in July, 2005, causing the comet to vent a giant plume of material from the comet's core. Scientists from around the world recorded and analyzed the composition of the plume, giving rare insights into the universe's wanderers.
The plume, however, seems to have altered Tempel 1's orbit, sending it careening into the asteroid belt that orbits the sun between Mars and Jupiter. The resulting collisions with belt asteroids caused a massive disruption in the normally stable orbits of several of the larger rocks. The asteroids were sent inward, toward sun and the center of the solar system, and toward the earth.
In what scientists agree is an "unimaginably uncommon occurrence," the rogue asteroids encountered yet another of the solar system's famous asteroids, 99942 Apophis, which some had predicted might pose an impact threat to earth. Apophis' path and density were powerful enough to nudge the rogue asteroids into a path that took them through what astronomers call the "planetary keyhole," the region in space through which traveling objects are affected by the solar system's larger bodies. Passing through the keyhole means that the asteroids, by this time a swarm of small-to-medium-sized rock, metal, and other elements, would enter Earth's gravitational field and be pulled down to the surface.
The map, above, shows predicted impact spots near population centers. The size of the circles indicates the number and size of asteroids expected to reach the earth's surface in that area. Scientists predict that no single impact will have enough force to destroy a city. Instead, areas predicted to be hardest hit, such as Moscow, will suffer what will appear to be widespread, intermittent nuclear bombardment.
World governments are scrambling today to devise plans to protect their populations. The Weekly Journal will continue to keep you updated as we learn the details of those plans.
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