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Prof. Sam Lawler

I hope* NASA saved this potentially hazardous asteroid specifically to announce right after they get all their funding cut/gutted/withheld by Trump to make people realize that NASA is really freaking important

blogs.nasa.gov/planetarydefens

*Yes, I know they absolutely did not do this on purpose. I'm just being snarky.

blogs.nasa.govNASA Shares Observations of Recently-Identified Near Earth Asteroid – Planetary Defense

@sundogplanets Wäre jedenfalls sehr raffiniert von der NASA 🤭😎

@sundogplanets Professor Lawler, may I bother your with a silly question about this that always occurs to me when these things become news? What determines the uncertainty of those numbers? For example: a ~99% chance of not colliding with Earth is not 100% due to it being impossible to know everything that's around the asteroid that could affect its trajectory, or is it something else??

@brunoc @sundogplanets

The International Asteroid Warning Network has a policy that whenever an object 50 m or more in estimated size has a 1% or greater assessed chance of Earth impact; the member agencies shall make public notifications as well as coordinating follow-up observations.

@brunoc it's a 1% chance and not a 0% chance because the orbit isn't perfectly well-measured. That chance will likely get smaller and smaller as the orbit is measured more precisely, which just takes time (small chance it'll get bigger and bigger...but unlikely)

@sundogplanets That's really fascinating stuff! Thank you, Professor!! Big fan, BTW!

@sundogplanets They saw the movie Don't Look Up and thought, hey, you know what would be funny...

@sundogplanets New proclamation from the Kin^h^h^h president: "No more telling people bad or scary news. That's my job."

@sundogplanets

the average citizen loves to complain about paying taxes and how it never benefits them. most have almost zero idea of just how much federal programs and money help them but they'll get a very vivid lesson this term.

@sundogplanets I don't wanna close my eyes, I don't wanna fall asleep cause I'd miss you babe and I don't wanna miss a thiiiing