NASA has taken an important step in ensuring Earth's security from asteroid attacks. The American space agency is ready with a new computer system called "Scout" that will help scientists in detecting potentially dangerous asteroids.
Scout will help scientists in spotting asteroids that may attack the Earth, reported Space Daily. It will allow them to calculate the possible impact of these asteroids on Earth's surface. The new computer program has the capacity to calculate the path and impact of asteroids heading toward earth.
According to NASA, some asteroids that are near to Earth are dangerous in nature and therefore, require better understanding and precise detection to build impact mitigation strategies. At present, astronomers use a website for the Minor Planet Center of Cambridge to post information about space objects. But it suffers from accuracy issues.
Scout is an improvement on this model as it checks the website automatically after every 10 minutes and calculates the path of objects that have been posted afresh. If it detects a dangerous asteroid, it informs the astronomers through text or mail. The astronomers then intensify their observations with the help of fresh calculations provided by Scout.
Well, this is definitely a significant development. But more than this, NASA has now launched a news service called Daily Minor Planet with the objective of educating people about the dangerous space objects, reported the Inquisitr. It will inform the public about the latest asteroid facts.
Matt Holman, director of Minor Planet Center - the NASA-funded organization behind this news service, said they want the Daily Minor Planet to educate the people in an entertaining way. This is because when they come across any news about threatening asteroid attacks, claiming to destroy the Earth, they may know where to go to find the facts.
It is worth mentioning here that almost every day, Earth faces the danger of asteroid collision. In 2013, scientists acknowledged the threat of falling space rocks. This happened when an undiscovered asteroid hit the Russian city of Chelyabinsk, causing injuries to a whopping 1,000 people.
