an asteroid is headed straight toward Earth initially scientists thought it would miss us but they've made some serious miscalculations and now it's headed right toward our giant Blue Marble what happens next does this mean the end of humanity can we change the trajectory of the asteroid and why might this actually happen by the year 2029 this is what if and here's what would happen if an asteroid hits Earth this year now this sounds like a fun hypothetical but an asteroid coming for Earth it's no laughing matter it could happen scientists had thought that asteroid 99942
also known as apus might hit Earth by the year 2029 a bofus was discovered in 2004 and scientists have been closely monitoring it ever since at one point research suggested that the asteroid had a 2.7% chance of hitting Earth yeah scary I know but since then new calculations predict that the asteroid will whiz by Earth at a distance of 30,000 kilm now considering that the Moon is 380,000 KM away this asteroid will be incredibly close but at least it won't be hitting us of course calculations can be wrong let's say that in this case they
are and Aus is coming right toward Earth way ahead of schedule the asteroid is going to hit us this year okay let's see what we're dealing with apus is 3 40 m in diameter for reference that's taller than the Eiffel Tower but is it the worst asteroid Earth has ever seen n lucky for us it's not even close the chickaloo asteroid that wiped out the dinosaurs was estimated to be 10 to 15 km wide so now we're dealing with chick's little brother so what does that mean for us will humans go extinct from this impact
well more on that in a bit but first let's look at whether we have any chance of stopping this asteroid ah sorry about that it's another one of those spam calls that I get constantly you get them too like to the point where you don't even bother answering your phone well luckily the sponsor of today's video Aura can help you with that did you know that data Brokers are making a fortune selling your information to robo callers and spammers all in hopes of getting more info from you like where you live well Aura works for
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know how big a pofus is and that it's moving at about 30 km/s now it's about the defense measures we could use there's a couple being looked into right now one of them being the kinetic impactor this involves sending a spacecraft to collide with the asteroid all in hopes of changing its velocity and trajectory NASA has run some successful tests using this method so that's an option next would be what's known as a gravity tractor a large spacecraft would fly next to the asteroid and over time its gravitational pull would eventually change the asteroids path
laser ablation is next on the list of options yeah Special lasers could be used to vaporize parts of the asteroid's surface this wouldn't destroy the asteroid but it could alter its direction as well as the size and impact of it and last but definitely not least is the final nuclear option yeah that's right as a final Resort we could nuke Aus and with the asteroid's massive size as well as the lack of time we have before it hits us this might be the only option but don't be too quick to hit that red button nuking
an asteroid can have some serious downsides it could split the asteroid up causing it to fragment then you'd have dozens more minor asteroids and meteors coming toward Earth making the impact even more devastating yeah and these wouldn't just be regular asteroids either because of the nuke they'd be r radioactive this would mean that significant parts of the world would not only be impacted with asteroids and meteors but they'd also experience radiation levels only seen during nuclear warfare so what's the best option here well it's tough to decide let me think about this for a second
H oh well it's too late now we took too long deciding what to do and now the apus will be here any second brace yourselves you wouldn't get a good look at the asteroid impact and that's because it landed somewhere in the middle of the Pacific Ocean this is the most probable spot an asteroid would land considering the earth's surface is mostly water so you might not see the impact but you definitely notice it once the asteroid hit our planet it was would be as devastating as several thousand nuclear bombs going off just with a
lot less radiation it would make a crater at the bottom of the ocean as big as a kilometer wide and what would happen next would be even more devastating the massive impact would create giant tsunamis that would rage worldwide several hours after the asteroid touches down cities along the Pacific coast would feel laus's impact the tsunamis would travel across the Pacific Ocean at jetliner speeds places in North and South America like California Peru and Chile would face towering waves due to the energy from the asteroid it would likely cause waves taller than 30 m waves
as big as this are responsible for one of the most devastating tsunamis ever in 2004 southeast Asia experienced a tsunami that generated waves over 30 m tall killing over 230,000 people but instead of waves like these reaching just a few countries this would be a complete Global catastrophy not only with the Americas experience these tsunamis but so with Japan Australia and the Philippines these places would all be devastated by the impact tsunamis like these would likely destroy millions of lives so that's what would happen if an asteroid hit the ocean but what if it made
impact on land well to start the impact crater would be much more significant we know that an asteroid's impact crater can be anywhere from 10 to 20 times the size of the asteroid itself and now there isn't any water to soften the blow so the diameter of the crater could be as large as 7 km with a depth of over 1 km depending on where it lands this asteroid could be big enough to devastate entire cities the initial impact would send a massive shock wave that spreads for hundreds of kilometers this could destroy entire buildings
and seriously damage infrastructure it would throw tons of dust and debris into the atmosphere it could get so bad that it could cause an impact winter this would be caused by a dust cloud temporarily blocking the sun causing crops and vegetation to die out which creates even more casualties something like this could last weeks or months and be an overall environmental catastrophe this entire event during and after could cause millions of people to be killed depending on where the asteroid lands we can only hope that an asteroid Collision like this would land as far away
from people as possible but now for the good news if Aus did somehow make an impact it wouldn't cause a mass extinction like the chielo asteroid did for the Dinosaurs the event would be incredibly traumatic and have lots of casualties but Humanity as a whole would live to see another day okay now that we've survived that what happens afterward what does the future of humanity look like well that sounds like a story or another what if
