Prophets and soothsayers have been predicting the end of the world for thousands of years, with possible extinction-level events cited as super-volcanoes or earthquakes, giant solar flares, pollution, plague and pestilence, and the favourite of the 20th century, nuclear war. There is no doubt that planet Earth is currently under-going what Confucius would describe as ‘interesting times’, with all of these proposed threats simmering away ominously in the background as we continue our ordinary lives. One of the other threats which could end Life as we know it, and one which has been credited with extinguishing the dinosaurs millions of years ago, is if the Earth was to be struck by a sizeable asteroid, and it is this scenario which could occur in the not-too-distant future.
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We are currently living under very volatile skies. Less than one year after a 10,000 ton meteorite exploded above the Russian city of Chelyabinsk in the Urals injuring 950 people, Russian scientists reveal that a nearby area of the country narrowly missed an impact from a 15 meter asteroid which skimmed past Earth last weekend. The asteroid, which was moving at 16km per second, passed within 11,300km of the Earth’s surface, an altitude which is below the orbit of geostationary satellites. It was discovered during its near miss by the Master Tunka station near Lake Baikal. The asteroid was not previously known.
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