Podcaster: Dr. Al Grauer
Title: Travelers in the Night Digest: 307 & 308 – Stepping it Up & Planning For Impact
Organization: Travelers in The Night
Link : Travelers in the Night ; @Nmcanopus
Description: Today’s 2 topics:
- From 2005 to 2013 the Catalina Sky Survey team led the world in NEO discovery. Meanwhile PanSTARRS was gearing up to compete & then pulled ahead in the friendly race. Then in 2016 a new camera at CSS and the Catalina team pulled ahead again!
- The CSS team spotted 2008 TC3 before it entered our planet’s atmosphere. It was harmless, but there might be bigger rocks that are much more deadly. NASA & FEMA are preparing plans for evacuation of cities should one be threatened. It’s only a matter of time and it’s best to be prepared.
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Bio: Dr. Al Grauer is currently an observing member of the Catalina Sky Survey Team at the University of Arizona. This group has discovered nearly half of the Earth approaching objects known to exist. He received a PhD in Physics in 1971 and has been an observational Astronomer for 43 years. He retired as a University Professor after 39 years of interacting with students. He has conducted research projects using telescopes in Arizona, Chile, Australia, Hawaii, Louisiana, and Georgia with funding from NSF and NASA.
He is noted as Co-discoverer of comet P/2010 TO20 Linear-Grauer, Discoverer of comet C/2009 U5 Grauer and has asteroid 18871 Grauer named for him.
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Transcript:
307 – Stepping it up
For nine glorious years, from 2005 to 2013, my team, the Catalina Sky Survey, led the world in the discovery of Earth approaching objects. During most of this time the PanSTARRS group was building and placing into operation their first telescope on the summit of Haleakala on the island of Maui. 2014 ended with PanSTARRS at 622 near Earth Asteroid discoveries to my team’s 616. The Hawaiians were the clear winners in 2015 finding a record breaking 754 Earth approaching objects. By the midpoint of 2016 the PanSTARRS group was ahead by more than 100 objects. In August of 2016 my team installed a new camera with a hundred million pixels on our 60 inch telescope on Mt. Lemmon, Arizona. Our discovery rate skyrocketed and once again we are in the lead in the discovery of near Earth asteroids. Both groups appear to be on a path to break their previous records. My team can’t rest on our laurels since the Hawaiians are working on a second telescope which they plan to place into operation in 2017.
Both PanSTARRS and the Catalina Sky Survey are funded by the NASA Near Earth Object Program. Our goals are to discover any potentially dangerous neighbors before the become a threat to planet Earth. Our friendly but very real competition gives humans the best chance to find dangerous objects as well as giving the American taxpayers the best bang for their buck.
308 – Planning for impact
My team the Catalina Sky Survey found the only two space rocks which humans have discovered before they entered the Earth’s atmosphere. Fortunately, they were both small and harmlessly exploded at about three times the height that airliners fly. For one of them, 2008 TC3, meteorite hunters were able to find pieces of this small impactor on the surface of the deserts of Sudan. Asteroid hunters missed the incoming object which exploded over Chelyabinsk Russia injuring nearly 1500 people in 2013 because it was lost in the glare of the Sun as it approached planet Earth. Given the efforts being made to develop new telescopes, cameras, and computer programs it is only a matter of time before asteroid hunters find another incoming space rock. Statistics indicate that it will be small and if you are lucky it will produce a light show for you to see as it harmlessly explodes high above.
Recently, NASA and FEMA hosted a session which focused on how to collect, analyze, and share the data about a hypothetical asteroid predicted to hit the Earth. Reality is that when we discover an Earth approaching object we can only be certain about what it is and what it might do by collecting more and more data. Confronted with the possibility that this hypothetical space rock would hit somewhere in a narrow band across Southern California or just off the coast in the Pacific Ocean they were forced to develop an evacuation plan for millions of people. Fortunately this was just an exercise, however, reality could come knocking and it is best to be prepared.
End of podcast:
365 Days of Astronomy
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