How we know 2002 NT7 will not hit Earth on 1st February 2019 - and it is normal for asteroids to be removed from the Sentry Earth Impact Monitoring table
EditOne thing that puzzles people is why astronomers originally thought it was a risk for Earth and then removed it from the table. So, this is how it worked.
First when they first observed it, with only a few observations, this was the range of predictions for its position for 1st February 2019
Earth is that little blue dot - as you can see it is just above the arc of their predictions and there was at that time a remote chance it would hit Earth. But it could be anywhere along that arc.
A little later this is what they had for the predictions just as a result of more observations. The asteroid hadn’t changed its orbit. They just measured it better and hte predictions were now:
Now there is a very short arc and it looks as if Earth is right in the middle of it
But with a bit more observation
Now it’s reasonably clear it’s going to miss, but we need to measure more carefully
And now they have a very exact prediction and it is certain, the asteroid is going to miss Earth by millions of miles.
I got these images from this video:
But the video is rather dark and the planets particuarly are faint and Earth is hard to see. So I increased brightness and contrast and coloured Earth in blue, in process losing some of the colour of the observations.
And no, they aren't hding anything that's just something from movies, never happens in real life, not for disasters. Would they hide warnings about an approaching hurricane? Of course not, they give al the details they can and save thousands of lives. It would be impossible anyway. Astronomers worldwide are involved in tracking the asteroids.
It's all done in the open through public electornic circulars from the mionr planet center.
2002 NT7 is just large enough to have some global effects. It would produce a crater perhaps 10–20 km in diameter.
It's an asteroid that is only just large enough to have some global effects.
As we see from this example, It is absolutely normal to remove objects from the sentry table and they have a whole table of removed objects. More than 2000 of them (many of those would have had only the remotest chance of ever hitting Earth and so never got to any kind of an alert level).
It’s the normal thing indeed, for objects to be removed.
When first discovered they may have a small chance of hitting Earth with a big error ellipse that includes Earth.
As they find out more the ellipse shrinks. Normally that leads to them working out that it misses Earth. Sometimes Earth remains inside the ellipse and so the risk can appear to go up for a short while, as happened for 2002 NT7, but as the ellipse shrinks further they find it misses.
The minor planets center does an immediate prediction - and other astronomers might also. The CNEOS funded by NASA has the most elaborate models, taking all sorts of things into account, even minor effects like effects of heating on the asteroid as it spins, and the Sun, all the planets and the Moon, larger asteroids and everything.
Theirs is the most accurate and final version of the prediction. Then others rely on them - and their predictions work. The asteroids fly past Earth as expected to the minute. None of this even can be hidden from anyone. NASA certainly can’t do it by itself, and they depend on their predictions to tell astronomers where to look to do their observations.`
For other details see
SEVEN TIPS FOR DEALING WITH DOOMSDAY FEARS
If you are scared: Seven tips for dealing with doomsday fears which also talks about health professionals and how they can help.
MORE DEBUNKS
More debunks: List of the articles in my Debunking Doomsday blog to date
Search the debunks using e.g. site:debunkingdoomsday.quora.com Nibiru - Google Search
Doomsday Debunked wiki: Doomsday debunked
Twitter feed: DoomsdayDebunked (@DoomsdayDebunks) | Twitter
Facebook group Doomsday Debunked has been set up to help anyone who is scared by these fake doomsdays.
TOP NEWS WITHOUT THE FAKE SENSATIONALIST NONSENSE
I’ve done a custom search engine to search top mainstream reputable news sites. Various versions, see:
You can also make your own custom search engines like that - easy to do in Google, I explain how I did it in New: Google News Without All The Nonsense - Top Astronomy News - Top Space Mission News - Top Science News - Top News
IF YOU NEED HELP
Do message me on Quora or PM me on Facebook if you need help.
There are many others in the group who are available to support scared people via PM and who can also debunk fake Doomsday “news” for you if you get scared of a story and are not sure if it is true. See our debunkers list
If you are suicidal don’t forget there’s always help a phone call away with the List of suicide crisis lines - Wikipedia
Anonymous asks