Latest news with #asteroids
RNZ News
a day ago
- General
- RNZ News
Guardians against the galaxy: Tekapo couple honoured for planetary defence contributions
Pam Kilmartin and Alan Gilmore pictured with Mt John's 1-metre telescope in 2019. Photo: Supplied / Fraser Gunn For 50 years Pam Kilmartin and Alan Gilmore have quietly worked to track asteroids that could pose a threat to Earth. The couple, now in their 70s, had contributed detailed observations to international planetary defence programmes, using their vantage point in Tekapo and teamwork to swiftly gather unique data. Their work saw them jointly awarded the New Zealand Order of Merit, although Kilmartin said she was "terrified" at the thought of receiving the honour. "I don't really know how we came to get something like this. We have just been doing what we like for the last 50 years," she said. "We kind of feel a bit guilty about being honoured for what is fun for us." Kilmartin and Gilmore had discovered 41 asteroids, a comet and a nova - the latter two being "accidental" discoveries, Gilmore said. The couple established a programme tracking near-Earth asteroids, initially from Wellington's Carter Observatory and later from the University of Canterbury's Mt John Observatory in 1980. Kilmartin and Gilmore with Ned and their telescope at their home in Happy Valley, Wellington in 1979. Photo: Supplied In the 1980s, evidence was mounting that an asteroid impact had caused the extinction of the dinosaurs and astronomers around the world were becoming increasingly aware of the potential threat posed by near-earth objects. Observatories around the world began tracking asteroids larger wider that 140 metres, within 20 times the moon's distance to Earth - that is, close enough to pose a collision risk. Kilmartin and Gilmore saw a gap in global search efforts: "the absence of any such work in the Southern Hemisphere," Gilmore said. Most of the discoveries were made by search programmes in Arizona and Hawaii, he explained. "Because we're in the Southern Hemisphere, there is a there is a parallax effect, that is, we're looking at the asteroid from a slightly different direction. That enables them to triangulate, to get a distance measurement estimate for the asteroid, and that improves the orbit calculation very quickly. So our location in New Zealand is very helpful for this work," he said. "The idea is to find these objects before they find come up with technology that could divert it a little bit." Such technology was put to the test in 2022 during NASA's DART mission, which successfully knocked a stadium-sized asteroid off-course . With their sons Ned (Edmond) aged about 6 years old and Chris, about 1, at the University house in Lake Tekapo Village in 1983 Photo: Supplied Kilmartin said her "vague" interest in astronomy was kindled in the small country town where she grew up, where "the stars were part of the scenery". Later, she deepened that interest at the Auckland Astronomical Society, joining a group of women learning the art of photoelectric photometry - a process to measure the brightness of stars. For Gilmore, the catalyst was seeing a shooting star while walking with his father one night in the 1950s. He was further inspired by a "neat little book on practical astronomy" that he found at the Hutt Intermediate School library that taught him how to make a telescope. By secondary school he was so adept at handling telescopes that he was invited to help test out possible sites for the University of Pennsylvania to set up a southern observation station in New Zealand. The pair met at an astronomical conference in Christchurch and married in Wellington in 1974 while working at the Carter Observatory - Kilmartin as an information officer and Gilmore as a researcher. It was then that they began working as a team, producing precise measurements that would put them on the international radar. "What really got us on the international scene was Michael Clark at Mt John Observatory discovered a small comet. He sent photographic plates of the comet to the Carter Observatory and Pam and I got more photos of it, and we measured up those plates and we produced the first precise positions of that comet globally," Gilmore said. The couple with their home telescope in Tekapo in 2020 Photo: Supplied The pair see their teamwork as a secret weapon, which allows them to report observations potentially faster than any other astronomy group in the world, Gilmore said. "We sort of share our skills back and forth," Kilmartin said. "Like they say, the sum is greater than its can be reporting observations internationally, literally within minutes of making them, because there's two of us operating," Gilmore said. "I'm controlling the telescope, selecting the next target and then operating the cameras that we have on the telescopes, that take many, many pictures. Pam drags those across to her laptop and runs a piece of software called Astrometrica which stacks the images so that we can find a particular asteroid. And then Astrometrica is able to measure the position of the asteroid and it produces the data in a format that we can then just simply paste into a website for the Minor Planet Centre in Cambridge, Massachusetts." Gilmore twice served as president of the Royal Astronomical Society of New Zealand and edited its newsletter for 22 years, while Kilmartin was secretary for 18 years. A NZ Post 'New Zealand Space Pioneers' stamp dedicated to the couple in 2019 Photo: Supplied From 1996 until their retirement in 2014, Gilmore was also Mt John Observatory's resident superintendent, managing its day-to-day operation. Gilmore had to learn to drive a tractor, while Kilmartin did "an awful lot of work shovelling snow off the paths and tracks", as well as hosting thousands of school children and visitors for tours. Now living in Tekapo with a large telescope at home, Gilmore said the couple continued to host groups. "We've tried to get involved with keeping our community involved and informed in astronomy," he said. "We send out, for instance, sets of sky charts every month, e-mailing them out to about 400 addresses. Some of them are schools and so on that circulate them to pupils." They said they were heartened by local growth in astro-tourism. Astronomy will "enhance your life," Kilmartin said, whether as a hobby or a career. More than a decade after their retirement, the pair continued making observations and sending data to the Minor Planet Centre. Gilmore said the University of Canterbury still supported them as "sort of honorary research associates", allowing them to access telescope time. "We just, for instance, worked until 1am this morning before clouds came in on one of the Mt John telescopes," he said. "Our work continues to be useful. It's not in any way cutting edge work, but it's a very handy contribution to international astronomy." Closer to Earth, champion of the country's plant science sector Alison Stewart has been recognised as a Dame Companion of the New Zealand Order of Merit. The current Foundation for Arable Research chief executive said the honour was a "very pleasant surprise" and exciting recognition for her field. "Plant science doesn't normally get profiled in this way," she said. Stewart has dedicated a 40-year career to sustainable plant protection, soil biology and plant bio-technology. Her work is credited for the commercialisation of biocontrol products used by New Zealand and overseas growers. She has also pioneered sustainable farming practices to improve crop yields and quality while minimising environmental impacts. Stewart said it had been gratifying work. "When the commercial companies that I've worked with have got products out in the marketplace that are being used by growers in New Zealand to support their sustainable production practices - and those products came from research that my research team has done over the 40 years... gosh, that's really nice to see," she said. Stewart was chief science officer at Marrone Bio Innovations in the US from 2013 to 2015, and general manager Forestry Science at Scion from 2015 to 2018. She describes her career as "a collection of all the things that I love doing, wrapped up into the most amazing jobs." Stewart said the recognition was not just about her. "I see it very much as a shout out for all those plant scientists in the country who do an amazing job to look after our native flora and support the development of our plant food producers," she said. "I think of the number of postgraduate students that I have supervised over the years. Seeing all of them go out to work in New Zealand companies - and they are now becoming leaders in their own right - I get a huge amount of satisfaction knowing that I contributed a little bit."
News.com.au
4 days ago
- General
- News.com.au
3 city-killing asteroids could strike Earth within weeks without warning
Good things don't come in threes. Venus is concealing at least three city-killer asteroids that could strike Earth in weeks without warning, potentially wreaking havoc upon our planet before we can react. 'Twenty co-orbital asteroids [space rocks in the orbit of two celestial bodies] of Venus are currently known,' the authors warned in the arockcalyptic study, which was published in the journal 'Astronomy & Astrophysics.' The international research team, led by Valerio Carruba of São Paulo University in Brazil, wrote that at least three of the asteroids — 2020 SB, 524522 and 2020 CL1 — that circle the sun in tandem with our twin planet have unstable orbits that take them dangerously close to Earth, the Daily Mail reported. If this shaky trajectory is shifted only slightly by a small gravitational change or other force, the asteroids could be set on a collision course with our planet, per the study. 'Co-orbital status protects these asteroids from close approaches to Venus, but it does not protect them from encountering Earth,' the researchers warned, according to the Daily Galaxy. Carruba & Co. came to this conclusion by using imitation space rocks to simulate a range of possible outcomes over 36,000 years, finding that there is a sizeable population of low-eccentricity asteroids — those previously thought to be harmless — that could be propelled toward Earth via gravitational shifts and other factors. To make matters worse, the aforementioned cosmic rocks' orbits make them almost invisible to Earthly detection devices. While scientists at NASA and other space agencies routinely track potentially hazardous near-Earth asteroids, the telescopes can't spot rocks in a suborbital path with Venus due to the sun's glare, which shields them like a cosmic cloaking device, WION reported. Due to this interstellar blind spot, the Rubin Observatory in Chile would have only two to four weeks to spot deadly asteroids, leaving us little time if they were on a collision course. For reference, a mission to engineer something that could deflect a killer space rock generally takes years to formulate. 'Low-e [low eccentricity] Venus co-orbitals pose a unique challenge, because of the difficulties in detecting and following these objects from Earth,' the authors wrote in their conclusion. It would be bad news if one of these intergalactic gravelstones hit home. Asteroids 2020 SB, 524522 and 2020 CL1 measure between 330 and 1,300 feet in diameter, making each one capable of destroying entire cities and causing massive fires and tsunamis, the Daily Mail reported. An impact would leave a crater over two miles wide and generate 1 million times more energy than the atomic bomb that was dropped on Hiroshima, Japan, in 1945. Unfortunately, due to the constraints of terrestrial monitoring equipment, we may have to look to the stars for a solution. 'We believe that only a dedicated observational campaign from a space-based mission near Venus could potentially map and discover all the still 'invisible' PHA [potentially hazardous asteroids] among Venus' co-orbital asteroids,' the authors wrote. However, the powers that be better hurry, as researchers predict that co-orbital asteroids' orbits could become unpredictable in just more than 150 years — a blip in the interstellar timescale.
Daily Mail
6 days ago
- General
- Daily Mail
Scientists warn city-killing asteroids could be headed for Earth within weeks after revealing fatal detection flaw
At least three city-killing asteroids that could strike Earth are hiding behind our closest neighbor in the solar system. A new study warns that Venus is blocking out our view of many near-Earth asteroids - large space rocks that cross or come near Earth's orbit - setting up the potential for a devastating impact. Researchers from Brazil, France, and Italy found that several asteroids in sync with Venus's orbit are extremely hard to spot because they're often hidden by the Sun's glare. Three in particular, 2020 SB, 524522, and 2020 CL1, have orbits that take these asteroids dangerously close to Earth. Even worse, the asteroids don't follow perfectly stable paths, meaning any kind of gravitational change could shift their course and pull them towards Earth. The three asteroids flying along with Venus measure between 330 and 1,300 feet in diameter, making each one capable of leveling entire cities and setting off massive fires and tsunamis. The researchers noted that the Rubin Observatory in Chile might be able to spot deadly asteroids approaching from our blind spot near Venus, but the window to see them would be extremely short, possibly lasting only two to four weeks. If one of these asteroids were to hit a city, it would make a crater over two miles wide and release over one million times more energy than the nuclear bomb dropped on Hiroshima, Japan in 1945. The international team, led by Valerio Carruba of São Paolo University, focused on asteroids that share Venus's orbit around the Sun, called Venus co-orbital asteroids. 'Twenty co-orbital asteroids of Venus are currently known,' the authors wrote in their report to the journal Astronomy and Astrophysics. 'Co-orbital status protects these asteroids from close approaches to Venus, but it does not protect them from encountering Earth,' they warned. Essentially, these asteroids are like dancers moving in step with Venus as they both move around the Sun; staying safely away from it due to their synchronized orbits. However, their wobbly and unpredictable paths can cross Earth's track, and if they reach that crossing point at the same time as Earth, they could crash into us. The near-Earth asteroids 2020 SB, 524522, and 2020 CL1 are the most concerning because each has a very small Minimum Orbital Intersection Distance (MOID) - the closest distance between their orbit and Earth's orbit around the Sun. A smaller MOID means an asteroid's chance of colliding with Earth increases dramatically. These three asteroids near Venus have MOIDs of less than 0.0005 astronomical units (AU), which is about 46,600 miles - closer than the Moon's average distance from Earth. In April, scientists at NASA increased the chance of an asteroid hitting the Moon to four percent. That prediction came after the probability of an impact on Earth rose to 3.1 percent - the highest odds ever recorded for a large asteroid. Researchers warned that they might be able to spot deadly asteroids approaching from our blind spot near Venus, but the window to see them would be extremely short, possibly lasting only 2 to 4 weeks Since telescopes here on Earth have a limited ability to see in all directions out in space, the researchers believe that a dedicated space probe needs to be launched towards Venus. According to their report, this is the only thing that can fully map the 'still invisible' hazardous asteroids hiding in Earth's blind spot. In February, NASA ruled out the possibility that another asteroid known as 2024 YR4 striking Earth in 2032. The threatening space rock is around 200 feet in diameter and still has a 1-in-25 chance of colliding with the Moon. Were it to hit the Earth, it would unleash a blast at least 500 times more powerful than that of the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima. Despite moving out of the danger zone, scientists are still tracking 2024 YR4 to learn its exact size of composition. If 2024 YR4 does hit the Moon in seven years, knowing these key facts could be a major boon for scientists around the world. The blast wouldn't affect Earth but it would be the first time scientists could watch a known asteroid create a lunar crater in real-time. The data gathered from this impact could help scientists understand more about other craters on the lunar surface.
Gizmodo
6 days ago
- Politics
- Gizmodo
Venus Harbors Secret Asteroids That Could Threaten Earth, Study Warns
Twenty years ago, Congress gave NASA a directive: find 90% of the near-Earth asteroids that could potentially harm our little world. Since then, astronomers have made major progress tracking down the rocky space debris, but a new study suggests there's a population of asteroids lurking around Venus that could pose a problem. These so-called 'Venus co-orbitals' share a similar path around the Sun with our neighbor planet but aren't harmless tagalongs. According to a paper under review for the journal Astronomy & Astrophysics, and currently hosted on arXiv, a yet-undetected group of the asteroids could pose a threat to Earth. Potentially hazardous asteroids (or PHAs) are those larger than 460 feet (140 meters) across that come within 0.05 astronomical units (4.6 million miles, 7.5 million kilometers) of Earth's orbit. Valerio Carruba, a researcher at the University of São Paulo, led the research. Carruba's team suspects there are more than the 20 known co-orbital asteroids of Venus, though they may be even harder to detect. 'Current ground-based observations are constrained by periodic observing windows and solar elongation limitations, though the Rubin Observatory may detect some of these objects during favorable configurations,' the team wrote in the paper. 'Space missions based on Venus' orbits may be instrumental in detecting Venus' co-orbitals.' These asteroids also have what scientists call a 'Lyapunov time' of about 150 years—meaning their orbits become chaotic and unpredictable beyond that time horizon, which is very soon in cosmic timescales. To figure out if they pose a threat, the researchers created digital clones of the asteroids and ran orbital simulations spanning 36,000 years. The team wrote in the paper that 'there is a sizable population of potential co-orbitals at lower eccentricity capable of numerous close encounters—and perhaps collisions—with Earth.' But these co-orbital asteroids are often hidden by the Sun's glare and are therefore only visible during narrow observation windows. The upcoming Vera Rubin Observatory, expected to begin operations in July 2025, may help catch some of them. But even Rubin's exceptionally powerful camera won't be enough to catch the whole population. The authors posited that a space-based observatory may be the best way to spot any yet-unobserved asteroids near Venus, either with a constellation design or a single spacecraft. With even small asteroids capable of releasing city-flattening energy on impact, finding these elusive Venus co-orbitals isn't just academic—it could be vital to planetary defense.
The Sun
7 days ago
- General
- The Sun
Sun hiding ‘invisible asteroid threat' as scientists warn Earth risks ‘collision' with ‘highly chaotic' Venus space rock
A FIELD of at least 20 asteroids has been found lurking near Venus, having previously been hidden by the Sun's glare, experts have revealed. The belt of asteroids is currently co-orbiting Venus, swinging around Earth's closest planetary neighbour with differing proximities to our planet. 3 Scientists from Brazil have warned that there could be more asteroids hiding near Venus, and that they may even pose a risk to Earth. "Twenty co-orbital asteroids of Venus are currently known," the authors wrote in their study, published in the journal Astronomy & Astrophysics. "Co-orbital status protects these asteroids from close approaches to Venus, but it does not protect them from encountering Earth." Asteroids are considered potentially hazardous asteroids (PHA) if they have a diameter of at least 140 metres and come within 0.05 astronomical units of Earth's orbit, according to experts. "We aim to assess the possible threat that the yet undetected population of Venus co-orbiters may pose to Earth, and to investigate their detectability from Earth and space observatories," the authors wrote. 3 Only one of the 20 known asteroids has an orbital eccentricity below 0.38 - with 0 being a perfectly circular orbit and 1 meaning an elliptical or oval-shaped orbit. This means some asteroids with wider orbits will be easier to spot, but those with minor orbital eccentricities may be difficult to detect. However, Venus asteroids with an orbital eccentricity higher than 0.38 could "pose a collisional hazard to Earth," the researchers warned. Co-orbital asteroids - ones that share an orbit with their nearby planet - are also known for having unpredictable orbits. This makes it harder to figure out how dangerous they are. Cold War era Soviet spaceship that was meant to reach Venus to FINALLY crash back to Earth at 17,000mph "The co-orbital asteroids of Venus are highly chaotic, with Lyapunov times of the order of 150 years," the authors explained. The Lyapunov time refers to how long an object's orbit takes to become unpredictable because of chaotic dynamics. So scientists have no idea how the orbit of an asteroid will evolve over the next 150 years, and if it could collide with Earth in the future. It's unclear how big the Venus asteroids are. But even a relatively small asteroid of 150 meters in diameter could strike Earth with a force equal to hundreds of megatons of TNT, Universe Today reported. For context, that is thousands of times more potent than the atomic bombs dropped in World War 2. The researchers said that more research is required to determine just how many asteroids are hiding near Venus. But since they are only observable periodically due to the Sun's glare, research from Earth's perspective might be difficult - even with powerful telescopes. The researchers suggest, therefore, that the best way to learn more about these hidden asteroids is to get a closer look. "Observations conducted from Venus' orbit, positioned facing away from the Sun, may enhance the detection of these bodies," the researchers explained.
