Asteroid 2012 DA14 hurtled by the earth on February 15, 2013, a few hours after a meteor hit a Ural Mountain town in Siberia, at a height of 17,150 miles with a speed of 17,400 miles per hour. The asteroid, first discovered last February, is of 150 ft wide and 143,000 tons of weight. If it struck the earth, it would have released 2.4 millions tons of TNT and wiped out 750 square miles. Compared to this asteroid, the one that had struck the earth and wiped out the dinosaurs 65 million years ago was 6-mile wide.
In a totally unrelated incident of cosmic travesty, a 49-foot meteor entered the earth's atmosphere few hours earlier at a hypersonic speed of 40,000 mph and exploded 12 to 15 miles high, releasing 300 to 500 kilotons of energy near the Ural Mountain city of Chelyabinsk, a city of 1 million people. Because of the shock, at least 1,100 people were injured, mostly from broken glass shreds and other eartly objects. Most of the injuries were minor. The object that exploded over Russia came from the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter. This was the worst hit by a space object in more than a century. In 1908, a meteor hit a forested area in Tunguska, Siberia, flattening an estimated 80 million trees.
Meteors are pieces of space rocks, usually from a comet or asteroid that enters earth's atmosphere. Many of them burn out by friction from earth's atmosphere, but the ones that survive and strike the earth's surface are called Meteorites.
In a totally unrelated incident of cosmic travesty, a 49-foot meteor entered the earth's atmosphere few hours earlier at a hypersonic speed of 40,000 mph and exploded 12 to 15 miles high, releasing 300 to 500 kilotons of energy near the Ural Mountain city of Chelyabinsk, a city of 1 million people. Because of the shock, at least 1,100 people were injured, mostly from broken glass shreds and other eartly objects. Most of the injuries were minor. The object that exploded over Russia came from the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter. This was the worst hit by a space object in more than a century. In 1908, a meteor hit a forested area in Tunguska, Siberia, flattening an estimated 80 million trees.
Meteors are pieces of space rocks, usually from a comet or asteroid that enters earth's atmosphere. Many of them burn out by friction from earth's atmosphere, but the ones that survive and strike the earth's surface are called Meteorites.
NASA Set to Launch First Test to Hit an Asteroid in Effort to Change Trajectory
NASA is set to launch a first of its kind test on November 23, 2021 to test out a still evolving technique to forcefully strike an incoming asteroid and veer its course off the earth in effort to eschew another dinosaur extinction-type blast by an asteroid. Scientists are still wary about a February 2013 explosion of a meteor over the Russian Ural Mountain city of Chelyabinsk that had injured more than 1,600 and inflicted widespread property damages. The Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART) is tentatively scheduled on November 23, 2021, involving a Space X rocket carrying a spacecraft in its destiny to collide heads-on with a smaller of the two gravitationally tied asteroids. The 1,344-pound, 59-foot craft will travel at a speed of 15,000 mph and, if things go as planned, in September 2022 will collide with Dimorphos, a 530-foot rocky body, orbiting its larger sibling, 2,600-foot Didymos. Dimorphos rotates completely around Didymos in an approximate 11 hours and 55 minutes. Didymos and Dimorphos are 0.6 miles apart. The craft will try to slow down the speed of Dimorphos by few seconds and adjust its rotational period. Although Dimorphos-Didymos pair is not in a trajectory to reach the earth, they will provide a great platform for our scientists to test an "asteroid intervention" approach.
Asteroid-Chasing Craft Launched by NASA
On late November 23, 2021, Double Asteroid Redirection Test, or DART, vehicle was launched on a Space X Falcon 9 rocket from Space Station Complex 4E at Vandenberg Space Force Base in California in its 6.8 million-mile journey towards its rendezvous, the smaller of a pair of gravitationally attached asteroids. 10 days before its collision with Dimorphos, tentatively around September 2022, DART vehicle will release a tiny observation spacecraft to observe and stream back to earth the collision and destruction of DART upon striking on the asteroid with a speed of 15,000 mph. The $330 million project will be a trial run for NASA in its series of potentially future tests to conduct experiments aimed at veering a possibly threatening incoming asteroid off its course and saving our planet from a dinosaur extinction-type collision.
DART's Mission of Collision with a Vending Machine-sized Asteroid Called a Success
NASA's Double Asteroid Redirection Test, or DART, vehicle has slammed into a 525-foot asteroid, Dimorphos, on September 26, 2022, creating a crater and forcing its trajectory as part of a serious test of whether humans stand any chance to save our planet from an incoming spatial object such as a meteor or a large asteroid. The answer, based on days of information and data gathered in the aftermath of the September 26, 2022, historic collision millions of miles away from our planet, is resoundingly yes as NASA Administrator Bill Nelson on October 11, 2022 said that the direct collision had altered the orbit of Dimorphos and shaved time of 11 hours and 55 minutes for a full circle around its companion, larger asteroid, Didymos, by 32 minutes, significantly higher than the anticipated 10 minutes.
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Psyche Launched to Chase Asteroid of Same Name
A Space X rocket on October 13, 2023 launched the NASA spacecraft Psyche that would get into the orbit of asteroid Psyche in 2029 to transmit valuable data that would empower us to know more profound insight into the earth's core. The asteroid Psyche discovered in 1852 is in the Asteroid Belt and made up of mostly metallic rocks. The asteroid might have been formed from the inner core of a planetary object in our solar system. The $1.2 billion mission will take the spacecraft, Psyche, around the Mars in 2026 and leverage Mars' gravitational boost to hurl itself farther to reach the asteroid's orbit by 2029. The spacecraft is expected to circle the asteroid once it enters the orbit at a maximum distance of 440 miles and minimum distance of 47 miles.
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COMET
NASA defines a Comet as a "cosmic snowball" made of frozen gases, rocks and dusts, which when heated by the sun, emits glowing aura brighter than planets. (Source: The Dallas Morning News April 5, 2024)
Debris from Halley's Comet to Display as Meteor Showers
One of the most renowned, imaginative and sought-after celestial objects from the family of comets an asteroids is the Halley's Comet that has startled and prickled the human imagination and stimulated the curiosity of astronomers for centuries. Halley's Comet returns to solar orbit some every 75 years, and it leaves behind plenty of celestial detritus. When the earth crosses the path of Halley's Comet, it runs into abundance of glowing debris left behind by one of the most renowned comets. The meteor showers from Eta Aquarids, left behind as meteor debris by Halley's Comet, can be seen in naked eyes. The Dallas Morning News reported in its May 4, 2025, edition that the Eta Aquarids showersc an be visible between May 6, 2025 and May 28, 2025, with the brightest streak on May 6, 2025. Although Halley's Comet returns our solar system every 75 years, we see its debris and the display of their celestial showers two or three times a year when the earth passes the orbit of Halley's Comet.
ECLIPSE
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Totality not to Arrive at Dallas until 2317
The April 8, 2024, presents a unique opportunity to millions of people in the path of totality and Dallas is the largest city in the path of totality. The last time that this area had seen totality was in 1878, and would not happen again until 2317. Totality refers to moon is going to cover the sun wholly, plunging the daytime into darkness.
Cloudy Sky Predicted for the Most of North Texas
Based on the National Weather Service's forecast issued on April 5, 2024, most of the North Texas will be under some sort of cloudy weather, dampening, even by a little degree, the strong enthusiasm among millions of people who live in the path of totality in the region and an additional hundreds of thousands of people who are traveling to the region to see a unique celestial event that our region will not experience a second time until 2317. The totality will happen between 1:40 PM CT and 1:44 PM CT.
As there is so much of hype and interest about the totality, this is also presenting as a unique opportunity for students and general public to learn more about space, celestial events, weather and clouds. Since a cloudy sky is anticipated for the most of North Texas, there are questions surrounding the type of clouds and degree of visibility for each type. According to a scholastic article published by the April 6, 2024, edition of The Dallas Morning News, there are three key cloud types that North Texas may expect to form during the time of eclipse:
* STRATUS CLOUDS
Low cloud layers appear more like ragged sheets and obscure the visibility. Lower cloud layers are in the region between 1,500 feet and 6,000 feet. Altostratus clouds may reach as high 20,000 feet and they are mid-level clouds. The so called high-level clouds, formally known as Cirrostratus clouds, may reach as high as 45,000 feet. Low Stratus clouds contain water balls and look like ragged sheets, thus obscuring the view of the eclipse watchers the most. Higher the clouds are, irrespective whether they are Stratus or not, they have more transparency because instead of water balls, they do have tinier ice formations.
* CUMULUS CLOUDS
Often Stratus clouds do break up into individual Cumulus clouds which are puffier, brightening the viewability.
* CIRRUS CLOUDS
Cirrus clouds are narrow-band clouds, often spotted at high altitudes and contain ice crystals. From the perspective of viewability, Cirrus clouds are most favorable and Low Stratus clouds are the least favorable to eclipse viewers if they eventually face a cloudy sky prediction.
Totality Fosters Collaboration among Students from Small Towns, Big Cities Alike
The NASA and National Science Foundation have launched a citizens project to collect data on the day of totality by involving dozens of communities and empowering them with tools, technology and knowhow to collect eclipse-related data (photos, videos, etc.) that may be a treasure-trove for future research. The Citizen CATE (Continental-America Telescope Eclipse) 2024 Project, according to an April 8, 2024, article published by The Dallas Morning News, is an effective means for some rural communities such as Kemp to get involved and inspire their students to dream big and bold for a lifelong passion of science and space. The April 8, 2024, totality is expected to be a wider display of a majestic celestial event compared to the 2017 totality. This time, 31 million people will have opportunity to regale this unique event just by looking up in the sky. Totality also creates opportunities for a firmer scientific and community bond threading through big cities like Dallas and Cleveland as well as small towns such as Kemp.
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