[FPSPACE] Boy hit by space rock

[E.P. Grondine]

Hi all - 

"Chances of being struck by a meteorite are 
around one in 100 million"

More crap put out by the manned Mars nuts.

That's for a meteorite, something small, not a
sizable ASTEROID or COMET chunk.

I haven't figured out the exact odds recently for 
death due to impact, but a seat of the pants 
estimate follows:

Impact mega-tsunami's have been occurring at a rate 
of about 1 per 1,000 years. Given current 
population densities, a rough fatality estimate 
would now be 60,000,000 - divide through by 
1,000, you end up with 60,000 per year.

(I have an idea for a comedy where Canada and 
Mexico run into each other claiming the west 
coast of the US after an impact mega-tsunami)

For land impacts, you have to calculate in the 
"nuclear winter" starvation effects on today's
6,000,000,000 people. Given today''s food storage, 
distribution,  and production technologies, the effects
are tough to calculate - anywhere from 500,000,000
to 1,000,000,000 deaths by starvation might be 
a good place to start, not including those lost in 
armed conflict following.

Land impact rates, including cometary dust 
veiling with the same effect, say about 1 per 
1,000 years.

Then we get into the smaller stuff, Tunguska 
class impacts of 15 MEGATONS or so, at a rate of
1 per 100 years - but then 7/10ths of the Earth's 
surface is water, and a lot of the rest is 
still sparsely inhabited.

In any case, we will be in the midst of Comet
Schwassmann Wachmann 3's debris train in 2022,
a mere 13 years from now.

Would someone please relieve Weiler and Morrison 
now for their role in blowing off the instructions
of the Congress as set out in the Brown amendment?

Or do we have to wait a while longer?

E.P. Grondine
Man and Impact in the Americas
(If you haven't read it yet, write me 
for the fpspace special. It also makes 
a great going away present.)
 

  



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