Doomsday Asteroid

Sixty-five million years ago, a gigandc asteroid collided with Earth where the Gulf of Mexico is now located. As a consequence of the resulting dust clouds and fire storm, sunlight was blotted from the sky and much of the Earth's animal, fish, and plant life was destroyed. The most obvious victims of this natural catastrophe were the giant dinosaurs that roamed the planet. Since the beginning of the nineteenth century, thousands of asteroids have been located orbiting between the neighboring planets of Jupiter and Mars. What would happen to our world arid human civilization if another giant asteroid found itself on a collision course with Earth? Could we prevent it? Could we survive a hit?In Doomsday Asteroid, science writers Donald W. Cox and James H. Chestek explain the important differences between asteroids, meteors, and comets and describe what might happen if the Earth suffered a collision with any one of them. How might we use existing satellite technology to track nearby asteroids? Could we use existing missile defense technology to ward off a collision with an asteroid? How might we mine the rich mineral deposits on asteroids that pose us no threat? Cox and Chestek make their discussion easy to understand without compromising the quality of the research. This fascinating book discusses various NASA programs, such as the spaceguard project to search for "near Earth objects" which could endanger life on our planet.