The Tunguska discussion got me curious. Does anybody know if the President of the USA has the authority to direct that nuclear weapons be launched to either destroy--or more likely deflect--an oncoming asteroid or comet? I want to stress that I'm not interested in anyone's opinion of President Bush, Senators Clinton or PHRASECENSOREDPOSTERSHOULDKNOWBETTER., Al Gore, John Kerry, or Fred Thompson, so let's keep the politics out of it. Rather, I'm interested in a purely theoretical discussion of what exactly would have to happen before such a launch took place. Here are some points to ponder:

1. Would the President need the consent of Congress to launch? (I don't think so.)
2. If not, would he need their approval for the funding? (Probably.)
3. Should the U.N. be consulted? (Remember, no politics. I know, I know, this one might be hard.)
4. Are such plans already in place? (IMO, if not they oughta be.)

I'm aware that there are other ideas being considered for "planetary defense" but they are years away. Nukes are available now. Thoughts?

My gut thoughts:
1. Consent of congress: Need? No. Get? Yes.
2. Funding: Yes
3. UN: I'm not going there.
4. Current plans: Probably, though mopping up after the impact is probably a bigger folder.


Questions of my own:

1. Can the current crop of nuclear missles escape Earth's gravity or are they limited to ballistic paths only?

2. If need be, could several missles be launched from the space shuttle? (wouldn't THAT cause an uproar!)

3. Would the missiles' navigational systems be able to direct them to an asteroid?

4. What would happen if a missle sucessfully hit the asteroid but something still impacted the Earth? (more uproar/conspiresy theories)

5. How would we convince Russia/China/etc that the missles were actually heading towards some object in space?

-Blast

I would imagine that there is nothing really that we could do...

Missiles are not designed to leave Earth's gravity well. That would certainly drive up the cost, and there were never any Russians on the moon, so there was never the need. Missle engines are not big enough, and I am pretty sure that the guidance systems are not up to snuff to hit a moving target in space, even if the engines had enough horsepower.

It certainly is possible to make an "asteroid killer" missle (and there would certainly be an upper-limit on the size of target that could be disposed of), but that would require a rather large source of funding, which would seem to kill the idea instantly for something that is likely to be needed once every few million years or so.

Agreed.

1. Nope, they are suborbital.
2. Given a few years to work things you, perhaps.
3. Nope, they are designed to target a geographic location, not something zipping in from interplanetary space.
4. Dunno
5. If they can "see" them, they can see where they are headed, I guess...

My opinion:

1) No, in fact it would probably be better to inform them after the fact, it's better to beg for forgiveness than to ask for permission when it comes to Congress.

2) Doubtful, the government has been funding the research and development of "black ops" for years and concealing the funding by inflating other aspects of the budget. For example, they could simply increase NASA's budget without specifying the exact project to be funded.

3) No because the UN would finally come to a decision to take action 30 seconds AFTER impact.

4) Yes, FEMA developed the plan, the details of which are being guarded by TSA employees and the whole thing falls under the Department of Homeland Security for execution.

I think that one of the main things to take into consideration when deciding on a delivery vehicle for the warhead would be that the object would need to be taken care of a lot farther away from earth than Hollywierd would have you believe. A hit weeks/months before the object were to collide with the Earth would be needed to deflect it sufficiently. What do we have READY to make this long of a journey?

Due to the fact that the nuclear detonation would be in a near vacuum, I believe that the device would have to be detonated in contact with the object to have sufficient effect too. Do we have a guidance system READY that would provide the terminal guidance for this? The ABM guidance system?

In response to norad45
1. the president does not need permision to release nuclear weapon(but will be raked ove the coals after)
2. Funding is already built into the budget to launch nukes and other spacecraft.
3. I'm with Blast here.
4. I dont know, with the way people work anymore probably not.
In response to blast
1. Our balistic missiles can escape orbit but in the normal course of things do not because their normal target is not in space but here on earth.
2. Dont know if they have the system in place but it wouldn't be hard to place a launcher from a sub in a shuttle (shouldn't take to much modifications)
3. They could direct it from the ground.
4. TSWHTF!
5. Have know idea?!

Wasn't there a Nat. Geo special that pretty much dispelled the idea of using a nuke to intercept an asteriod? I believe they said it would either be totally ineffective or at best could potentially make the situation much worse by fragmenting the asteroid.

re, #4.

Odds are, something will impact. We have no way of predicting what the shot pattern would be. It's all very heroic and macho to talk about nuking something, but you'd have better control with a relative small kinetic impactor or a motor that makes a softish landing nudging the entire thing out of the way.

It's one thing to catch a bullet with your teeth. It is a completely different one to catch a load of buckshot with your teeth.

If an asteroid was heading in this direction, there should be considerable warning ahead of time.

If a rocket could be sent to knock it off course enough while its far enough out, wouldn't that deflect it enough? Embed the rocket nose, then activate the jets? Just one degree off on your compass in a 50-mile trek would put you way off your target.

Not that I know what I'm talking about. I guess reading all Robert Heinlein's books isn't enough...

Sue