Stephen Hawking says asteroids pose ‘MAJOR THREAT’ to human and ALIEN civilisations
Physicist says doomsday space rocks are dangerous to EVERY intelligent species in the universe
PROFESSOR Stephen Hawking has issued a terrifying warning about the threat posed by apocalypse asteroids.
The physicists said doomsday space rocks are a threat to humanity and any other intelligent civilisation which exists in our universe.
, an "global movement" dedicated to protecting our species, Professor Hawking said: "One of the major threats to intelligent life in our universe is high probability of an asteroid colliding with inhabited planets."
Asteroid Day's shocking new video is a wake-up call to humanity, urging scientists, politicians and the public to take the threat seriously.
Astronomer Patrick Michel said our solar system was packed full of gigantic space rocks, some of which are more than 1 kilometre in size.
We are tracking the movements of about 90 percent of these asteroids, which would wipe out humanity if they ploughed into Earth.
This means there are a vast number of rogue rocks which could be on a collision course with our planet.
But these gigantic objects are not the only threat to our civilisation.
Michel said: "We only know about 15 or 20 percent of the objects which are larger than a few hundred metres in size.
"If these bodies impact Earth, they can cause regional damage across a whole country or even a continent."
There are several proposed ways to tackle asteroids. The first would involve a "gravity tractor", which is essentially a space ship designed to tug the rock onto a new path using its own gravitational pull.
Others would involve blasting the space rock with some sort of projectile to try and steer it onto a new course, or even blowing it up with a nuke.
However, this could backfire on humanity because it would cause radioactive rock fragments to rain down on the planet.
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Astronomer Carolyn Shoemaker is an expert on asteroids. She discovered Comet Shoemaker–Levy 9, which broke apart and then spectacularly plunged into Jupiter.
She called for more study of doomsday space rocks.
"The more we learn about all of these objects, the more we can be prepared for preventing an impact that would be dangerous to us."
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