Astronomers Fear an ME
Impact Event Could Precipitate
a Nuclear Holocaust
Exclusive YOWUSA Interview With Dr. Brian Marsden, Associate Director of the Smithsonian Astrophysics Observatories Reveals a New and Frightening Post-911 National Security Risk
YOWUSA.COM, 10-November-01
Marshall Masters
…Continued
MARSHALL MASTERS: When you say that people will die from the impact event as well as a nuclear exchange, the issue of yield becomes relevant
given that the same measure of force is used to determine the destructive force of both meteorites and nuclear warheads. For the sake of argument,
how large would a meteorite need to duplicate the severe regional havoc as the one that struck Mesopotamia (Northern Iraq) 4,000 years ago?
BRIAN MARSDEN: as I say, it looks as though the meteorite might have been 150 meters across--the size of one of the pyramids in Egypt, say. An
impact like that corresponds to about 100 megatons of TNT, a little larger than the largest nuclear detonation to date. The 150 meters is a guess
based on the size of the crater. Of course, the impactor could have been somewhat larger before it came into the earth's atmosphere.
MARSHALL MASTERS: Why do you say it is tough to detect 150-meter objects with our search programs?
BRIAN MARSDEN: NASA has set a goal to find 90% of the kilometer-sized NEO’s by 2008. It did this because it was interested in finding objects that,
if they impacted the earth, would directly affect everyone on the planet. It is only just becoming interested in objects half a kilometer across or less, but
our current equipment is not optimized to find these smaller objects. Furthermore, the smaller the size the more numerous the objects, which makes it harder to catalog a significant fraction of them.
MARSHALL MASTERS: How is NASA in fact doing in terms of its goal?
BRIAN MARSDEN: NASA'S goal with regard to the kilometer-sized NEO’s is a little over-optimistic. Even though we have found perhaps 50% of the
kilometer-sized NEO's (or, more correctly, near-earth asteroids), it gets progressively more difficult to find the remainder. After all, we were already
30% complete five years ago, and I doubt that we can be more than 70% complete by 2008.
Furthermore, in setting the 90% goal, NASA was really thinking only of actual detection, and it made little or no provision for the task of determining
the orbits of the objects found with sufficient accuracy to say for sure that some of them cannot hit us during the next century or so. Nevertheless,
since impacts by kilometer-sized objects statistically occur at intervals of 100,000 years or more, the odds are better than a thousand to one that we
shan't be hit by one, known or unknown, during the next century.
While being good odds, they are clearly not acceptable, given the immensity of the disaster if we just happen to be unlucky. But given that we shall surely
be continuing to search and refine orbit computations for kilometer-sized objects long after 2008, the chances will increase, as time goes by, that we
shall indeed be able to recognize the next kilometer-sized impactor and the date it will hit at least decades ahead, and that will presumably be enough to send out missions to deflect it.
MARSHALL MASTERS: So you're saying the situation is acceptable with regard to kilometer-sized objects?
BRIAN MARSDEN: Actually, I think it basically is. There is the problem of the long-period comets, which are simply too far away and faint to detect
more than a year or two before they could hit us. I think these represent less than 2% of the problem, but if the hope is actually to find the comets before
they hit, we have to continue to search indefinitely. The real difficulty is whether with even two years' notice (and it might be a lot less), we could actually take evasive action.
MARSHALL MASTERS: And what about 150-meter asteroids like the one that seems to have hit Iraq 4,000 years ago?
BRIAN MARSDEN: Here the situation is very different. We currently know at most 2% of the population. True, we knew perhaps only 0.5% of them five
years ago, but we've obviously got a very long way to go before we'd be likely to know the one that is next going to hit us. Furthermore, that next hit is
likely to be quite soon. Statistically, a 150-meter object hits the earth every few thousand years, and if that one in Iraq was the last one, the next is just about due any day now.
MARSHALL MASTERS: Given that you feel we do not face an imminent danger from the Kilometer-wide NEO Earth crossers that has NASA's full
attention, you've sure got me worried now about the 150-meter objects. If it is a fact that we are now in the statistical crosshairs of an impact event like
the one that devastated Mesopotamia 4,000 years ago, I've got to ask: Are we vulnerable to an unforeseen impact event of this magnitude today because we simply lack the technology to track the150-meter NEO’s?
BRIAN MARSDEN: No, we have the technology we need to find and catalog these objects available today. The reason it is sitting on the shelf is that we
simply lack the political will to put it to work, because politicians find the costs to be unattractive.
Keep in mind that the funding set aside for attending to dangers is calculated on a cost-per-death basis. At some point, it simply becomes
prudent from an accounting standpoint to let people die even though their deaths can be prevented.
I personally find this cost method analysis to be morally repugnant. But it is, you could say, the Golden Rule. He who has the gold makes the rules. In
this case those who make the rules have set an arbitrary limit on what they are willing to spend and all we can do is to make what little they give us go as far as possible.
Perhaps the new world we live in since 911 will change all that. One can at least be hopeful and assume so. In any case, the new scenario conceivably affects everyone on the planet indirectly.
MARSHALL MASTERS: Assuming that the government's thinking has changed, and that our leadership is now viewing smaller impacts as a
matter of national security and were suddenly willing to fund a search program for 150-meter objects, what technology would you need to catalog
these objects; what would it cost; and how soon could you have it up and running?
BRIAN MARSDEN: If national security were the primary justification for this level of effort, we would need to use build and deploy a suite of advanced
special purpose 4- OR 5-meter telescopes in the Northern and Southern hemispheres, along with computer analysis support and adequate 24/7 staffing.
Off-hand the cost to build and deploy this system, not including operational costs, would be approximately 10 million dollars per telescope and it could
take several years to make the full system operational. However, this would, after a few decades, give us a better than 50% chance of finding potential
150-meter impactors, as opposed to the at best 2% chance we have today.
Operating costs would likely be in excess of 10 million dollars per year, and there is a 1% chance the next 150-meter impactor will come, unannounced,
during this time. Granted, a success rate of more than 90% would therefore be nice, but that would require extensive searches from space and the
enormous additional cost that would entail. After all, 50% is a lot better than we should have if we don't move beyond our current chicken-feed searches.
MARSHALL MASTERS: Any substantial gain in our ability to detect these 150-meter objects is better than what we've presently got, but given the
current fragile and explosive tensions in the Middle East, we simply haven't got years to deploy such a system, which is not to say it shouldn't be done.
However, for the sake of decreasing what is obviously a serious threat to our national security, what can we do today?
BRIAN MARSDEN: There a great deal we can do today, provided we have the political resolve. For example, there are more than enough telescopes
of sufficient size currently in operation that could be quickly re-purposed to the task cataloging 150-meter NEO Earth crossers, that is, provided the
owners of those telescopes could be convinced to allow the conversion. Aha, and there would be the rub. Somebody would have to scratch their
backs to get them. However, this would get us up and going in relatively short order. Again, it is only a matter of will. We have the technology and as
my friends at NASA would say, "we're good to go."
MARSHALL MASTERS: It is reassuring to know that we have an immediate and workable option, but the political process in Washington has more
twists and turns than a donkey trail, and all too often all you're left with is what the donkey leaves behind. Given this, if both of your short-term or
long-term options are viewed as being politically untenable, is there a politically expedient compromise path we could follow?
BRIAN MARSDEN: we're already stretched to the extreme by obtuse political compromises and from a general deficiency of funding from NASA
and other international organizations and nations. The problem is that computers -- and even the 1-meter telescopes and imaging devices that are
currently being used -- are cheap when compared with people. Everyone seems to think that computer technology is all we need, but we cannot do the whole thing with computers alone.
Regardless of the equipment funding, it takes real people with real talent and a real commitment to make this work properly. However, this requires
an ongoing commitment, and this I fear would frighten those in Washington more than anything else.
MARSHALL MASTERS: One of the most tragic lessons we learned as a result of 9-11, is that when we allow ourselves to become overly dependent
on computers as a people replacement, we're inviting unforeseen catastrophe. However, many would still argue that it is easier to measure
productivity gains as result of computerization, as opposed to the efficient recruitment and management of qualified people. With this in mind, how
could you possibly hope to justify the additional manpower requirements inherent a project of this scale?
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BRIAN MARSDEN: That would be very simple. Because the NEO search programs have always had to beg for money the staff of the Minor Planet
Center work unpaid hours every week. A short week for us is 80 hours, even though we are salaried at 40 hours.
But those of us who work on that scale are the lucky ones, you might say, as others in the search business willingly work full time + overtime weeks but
are paid for only 20 hours. Why do they do it? Because they believe so much in what they are doing! I'd certainly love to see a defense contractor
like Boeing or Lockheed get that much productivity out their employees, even at twice the price.
MARSHALL MASTERS: To be honest, Dr. Marsden, I was a contractor at Lockheed myself on a satellite project, and from my personal experience I
would definitely say that you have an airtight argument there. But then, I'm not the one making the decision. But if I were, the first question I'd ask you
is: "Given your present situation, what are your chances of finding a 150-meter impactor before it starts a nuclear war in the Middle East?" How would you answer that question?
BRIAN MARSDEN: Given the present level of financial support for our present efforts, the chances are somewhere between none and dumb luck.
Simply put, we must now consider ourselves to be wholly vulnerable to this risk, and all of us in the NEO-detection field find this deeply troubling, since the world changed for the worse on September 11.
It is About Our Lives and Their Legacies
After concluding my interview with Dr. Marsden, I made a cup of hot coffee and reviewed our question-and-answer session several times. The part that
really bothered me the most is that our leaders use formulas to decide who will die and who will live. Perhaps there was a time when that was a
politically expedient way to manage the NEO threat, but wasn't it was also that kind of thinking that allowed us to blindside ourselves to the events leading up to September 11, 2001?
Is it possible that our leaders in Washington will give this national security threat the attention it deserves? Most likely not, but they can depend on one
absolute - the Internet will not give them a pass should they fail us again by letting an unforeseen impact event trigger a global nuclear holocaust.
Warnings like those mentioned in this article will be tucked away in the niches and corners of the Internet where future historians will eventually find
them. In that future time, the most urgent goal of generations will be defined with a simple mantra, “never again.” With this mantra in mind, they apply
these candid warnings with firm brushstrokes across the legacies they will paint for our leaders.
No matter how great your achievements in this lifetime can be; leaders beware – do not ignore this potential brushstroke of fate if you truly value your own legacy.
About Dr. Brian G. Marsden
 Associate director and astronomer at the Smithsonian
Astrophysical Observatory in Cambridge, Massachusetts.
Born in Cambridge, England, Dr. Marsden lived through the air attacks on England during WW II as a child and remembers the horrors of what happens when death falls from the sky. Filled with a great
purpose by those early memories, he is committed advocate of public education about the ever-present threat of impact events, which he does in addition, to his many
NEO detection responsibilities. He is truly a hero by today’s definition of the term.
- SPECIALTIES: Celestial mechanics and astrometry, with particular application to the study of comets and asteroids.
- EDUCATION: Undergraduate education at Oxford
University; Ph.D. degree from Yale University;
dissertation on the orbits of the Galilean
satellites of Jupiter.
- NOTABLE DISCOVERIES: Successful track record
of predicting the return of several lost comets
and asteroids. His most famous prediction
was the 1992 return of Comet Swift-Tuttle, which
has the longest period of any comet ever
successfully predicted.
- PUBLICATIONS: "Catalogue of Cometary Orbits" -- Thirteen editions published since 1972.
- INTERNATIONAL ASTRONOMICAL UNION (IAU): Director, IAU Minor Planet Center (1978 – Present). Responsibilities include the issuance of electronic information several times each day plus batches of
printed circulars monthly with positional observations, orbital elements and related information about comets and asteroids.
Director, IAU Central Bureau for Astronomical Telegrams (1968 –
2000). Responsibilities included the timely dissemination of information about transient astronomical objects and events.
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