Not 5 tons of mass, but equivalent to 5 tons of dynamite exploding. It was a small impact device designed to study the nucleus of a comet. The impactor weighed only 820 lbs.

NotCoach on December 14, 2012 at 1:50 AM

The rock star/astrophysicist missed that basic detail? Colour me incredulous.

The other choice is the target the asteroid with a bioengineered enzyme that eats the asteroid, converting it to twinkies, Ho Ho’s, and Lithium ever ready batteries.

RINOs are people too on December 14, 2012 at 6:26 AM

Actually, if we converted it to Twinkies, it would never get here, as the Teamsters would insist on delivering it, then go on strike because they would be asked to load it, too.

Wha? There aren’t any? We’re screwed…

Thanks fer nothin’.

You should be able to calculate the enerrgy required to deflect a NEO, but the real trick is the accuracy calculating the trajectory that far ahead in time in the first place.

Red Creek on December 14, 2012 at 8:45 AM

We should probably just start nudging all Earth killers into Jupiter or the Sun just to be safe.

I’m thinking if someone discovers a planet killer heading for a collision, the governments just won’t tell anyone.

Bishop on December 13, 2012 at 10:50 PM

They poked fun at that in the recent Steve Carell movie about an asteroid wiping out the earth. At the beginning of the flick, it’s stated they’ve got 3 weeks til it hits. Then towards the end, it’s revealed it was really 2 weeks all along and it’s implied the government hid that from the public(not sure why, as civil unrest would be bad no matter what).