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Astrophysics > Earth and Planetary Astrophysics

arXiv:2201.10663 (astro-ph)
[Submitted on 25 Jan 2022]

Title:Don't Forget To Look Up

Authors:Philip Lubin, Alexander N. Cohen
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    Abstract: We discuss a hypothetical existential threat from a 10
    km diameter comet discovered 6 months prior to impact. We show
    that an extension of our work on bolide fragmentation using an
    array of penetrators, but modified with small nuclear explosive
    devices (NED) in the penetrators, combined with
    soon-to-be-realized heavy lift launch assets with positive $C_3$
    such as NASA SLS or SpaceX Starship (with in-orbit refueling) is
    sufficient to mitigate this existential threat. A threat of this
    magnitude hitting the Earth at a closing speed of 40 km/s would
    have an impact energy of roughly 300 Teratons TNT, or about 40
    thousand times larger than the current combined nuclear arsenal
    of the entire world. This is similar in energy to the KT
    extinction event that killed the dinosaurs some 66 million years
    ago. Such an event, if not mitigated, would be an existential
    threat to humanity. We show that mitigation is conceivable using
    existing technology, even with the short time scale of 6 months
    warning, but that the efficient coupling of the NED energy is
    critical.

Comments: 15 pages, 8 figures
          Earth and Planetary Astrophysics (astro-ph.EP);
Subjects: Instrumentation and Methods for Astrophysics (astro-ph.IM);
          Physics and Society (physics.soc-ph); Space Physics
          (physics.space-ph)
Cite as:  arXiv:2201.10663 [astro-ph.EP]
          (or arXiv:2201.10663v1 [astro-ph.EP] for this version)

Submission history

From: Philip Lubin Prof [view email]
[v1] Tue, 25 Jan 2022 22:54:35 UTC (5,050 KB)
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