NASA sealed a deal with the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) to collaborate and protect the Earth from asteroid attacks using nuclear bombs.
NNSA is a branch of the Department of Energy that is responsible for national security through military application of nuclear science. This department, as well as NASA, has been independently researching the possibilities of using nukes to deflect all forms of foreign objects from space. The new partnership promises a stronger result, with rocket scientists and nuclear specialists pooling their knowledge and resources in order to stop a real life "Armageddon" in the future.
A NASA study has concluded that as of now, nuclear weapons are the best option to fight off killer asteroids and comets. Some experts, however, claim that the resulting rock fragments could make the situation worse, and that deflecting an asteroid may prove to be a better solution, according to Daily Mail.
Other non-nuclear proposals include gravity tractors, using sunlight to "boil off" parts of the near-Earth object, and using lasers or high-speed spacecraft to nudge the object off of its collision course with Earth, Popular Science reports.
To read more about using nuclear weapons to save the Earth from asteroids, check out HNGN's exclusive interview with John L. Remo, who recently submitted a paper on the subject to the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists.
