In our new serial , A Scientist Responds , we ’re dredging up the enceinte and tremendous tragedy picture of days past — and we ’re make scientists view them . Today ’s movie : 1998 ’s asteroid thriller , Deep Impact . The scientist : io9 ’s resident geophysicist , Mika McKinnon .
The Movie: Deep Impact
Deep Impact is a tale of comet , politics , total death , and the increasingly poor decisions of hormonal teenage astronomer Leo Biederman ( played by a young , pre - Hobbit Elijah Wood ) . When Biederman discovers a jumbo comet that put an imminent scourge to Earth , a team of cosmonaut attempt to microwave the comet into limbo . After this plan go ( unshockingly ) wonky , Deep Impact turn over away from rah - rah nationalism toward the disturbing politics of who President Beck ( the always - reassuring Morgan Freeman ) will save to rebuild in the smoldering wreckage of culture . But do n’t worry : after repeatedly demonstrating what a terrible estimate it is to allow hormonal high schoolhouse scholar to make liveliness - or - death choices , Leo prove that with even more terrible life option , he can at least salve the girl by outrunning a tsunami on a motorbike .
Deep Impact: Everything will be okay as long as teenagers are still getting it on.
The Science
Deep Impact actually feature something close to a naturalistic looking at how our beau monde might face a major wallop upshot — although in our world , it ’d probably be much , much worse . Here ’s how some of the the scenario the movie shows us might play out in real life :
premiss # 1 : A monolithic comet is about to dispatch the planet and kill everything on it . How often does this happen , really ?
Thankfully , asteroid impacts watch over a , “ The risky it is , the less likely it is to happen ” inverse vividness verses frequency relationship : small no - big - deal impacts happen all the time , while gravid devastating disaster happen passing seldom .
Small impact events happen all the time; large impact events happen less frequently. Image credit:Stephen A. Nelson.
petite shock events are a daily occurrent , with dust burning up as fleeting shooting star every night , andexplosive case in the upper atmosphere happen every few months . A city - flatten airburst event like a slimly - bigger and bad - positionedChelyabinsk meteoror the1908 Tunguska explosiononly happen about once every few centuries , with personal odds of witnessing one approaching1 % over a lifetime . Impact - induct extinction events go on even less often , decimating life on the planet once every 10 to 100 million years . This is so infrequent that the odds of an impact during our lifetimes is so rare we do n’t even have a good conversational verbal description for it — but the planet - wide annihilating consequences mean your personal odds of end from an impact consequence are somewhere between1:250,000and1:700,000 . For context , that ’s less likely than death by poisonous sting , and more likely than death by pyrotechnic accident .
Verdict : Possible — but super unlikely within our lifetimes .
Premise # 2 : A comet is going to crash into the Earth and kill us all , and there ’s not much we can do .
Given the level of engineering in 1998 when Deep Impact premier , Secretary of the Treasury Alan Rittenhouse had it entirely correct when he bemoaned , “ What difference does any of it make anymore ? ” Even now , over a ten and a half later , our progress on even track potentialhazardous impactorswith enough lead - prison term to do anything about them is downright unfathomable , and the lack of technology to do absolutely anything to save our planet is even more depressing .
alas , humans are awful at dealing with gamy intensity , low-toned - frequency events , and declare that they ’re totally going to win the drawing but will never suffer from catastrophe . accordingly , our funding to identify and track possible impactors , and our enquiry on mitigating them , is dirt . All - sky surveys areslowly trackingmost things big enough to wipe out the major planet even ifcity - killers can still sneak terrifyingly closemouthed with impunity , andprivateorganizationsare doing their just tofill in the technology gapfordeveloping proficiency to actually do somethingaboutsaving our planetif only we can get enough lead - clock time . If this want of serious readying freaks you out and you want to help switch it , check outB612 Foundation’sSentinel Mission .
Verdict : Highly plausible — this is middling much precisely how doomed we are .
assumption # 3 : The giant comet headed towards us was not picked up by any of the agency or investigator deep - scan the sky , but a teenager with his backyard scope did spot it .
The American military ca n’t even keep the orbit of theirclandestinespy satellitessecret from amateur astronomers for long ; a monumental comet coming to destroy the satellite would absolutely be detect by everyone else , and the construction of the Messiah space vehicle would ’ve been photographed in detail long before the President ’s speech .
Why would astronomer Marcus Wolf need to protect his night vision with red lights since he doesn’t need observations to make orbital determinations anyway?
The deep trouble though seems to be that astronomers in this movie do n’t really count at genius . This is unmistakably clear when teen astronomer Leo Biederman ad lib decides the field of view for his telescope is slap-up than 10 point , the aloofness covered by two clenched fist hold at arm ’s length , and manages to find Alpha Centauri , a asterisk not seeable in the northern cerebral hemisphere . It does n’t get any well when we switch off to his doomed mentor , Dr. Marcus Wolf . By the time Wolf performs the world ’s fastest , kempt orbital determination on most no data while munching on pizza before run out off to make an instant report on a comet that would n’t arrive for over two class , I ’ve already written him off as an noncitizen from another dimension dead lacking in night - vision rods in his eye , an discernment of orbital mechanic , and common sense .
While we ’re at it , although “ extinction outcome ” are perfectly a thing , and even “ mintage - grade quenching events , ” no self - respect scientific newspaper has called them “ E.L.E. ” or “ Ellie ” even after this movie came out . If an overly - enthusiastic fact-finding journalist is going to confuse a civilization - ending cometary impact for a Presidential sex scandal , they ’re going to need to be more oblivious .
Verdict : No . Just no , not likely at all , and it makes me weep inert split for heavily - work astronomers everywhere .
premiss # 4 : Comet Wolf - Biederman is smart and blue and surrounded by a halo of dust with a long , beautiful seat of topsy-turvyness to endanger the spaceship . It ’s pretty much distil awesome , right ?
Wolf-Biederman has an albedo so bright, it may actually glow instead of just reluctantly reflect sunshine.
Eh . Sure , it ’s near enough . I ’m willing declare President Beck forgot his high schooling geometry classes when he declared a three - dimensional volume is equivalent to a two - dimensional area during his scare - fest news conference , and I ’m unforced to make similar leeway for political reporter Jenny Lerner mix up a comet ’s coma , the unfixed envelope palisade the nucleus , and its tail , the long trail of dust and gas push away from the sunshine by radiation air pressure and the solar winding . All of that gets trump out by ascertain the lander successfullyharpoon the cometwhen Rosetta and itslittle lander Philaewere but adream - in - developmentand had not yetmade it off the planet .
Comet harpoons have moved from science fiction to flat-out science since 1998.
More bewilderingly , Wolf - Biederman is mayhap the brightest , highest - albedo comet that has ever be . I can handle the endearing , esthetic blue as an ion empennage ( even though it ’s betoken in entirely the wrong focus as real comet narrative point forth from the sun , not away from the direction of change of location ) , but how is a dirty mess of rubble , crank , and rock perhaps that bloody shiny ? !
Verdict : Big - stroke precise - ish , but the details fall apart .
assumption # 5 : Fake NASA snatch up together a starship propel by nuclear blasts to land on an asteroid and blow it to smithereens . Does n’t real - life NASA also have a nuke - power Orion epitome ?
We don’t have the technology and couldn’t get it developed, tested, and reliable within a year, but the history of spacecraft development had taken a different route it may have been possible.
In their infinite wisdom , NASA recycled the name of theoriginal nuclear - power Project Orionfor their“Hey , we ’re move to Mars ! ” Hunter spacecraftthat relies ontraditional chemical rockets . The two have nothing in common , and I ’ve never find a persuasive rational number for purposely courting the unnecessary and oddly common mix-up . The close NASA comes to the nuclear - powered spacecraft business is loading bantam reactors onto the rare bird of passage or artificial satellite where solar wo n’t cut it , and even thenthey’re try awfully hard to find choice .
That said , Deep Impact cause the mechanics of taxiing astronaut to the futuristic atomic spacecraft in a separate vehicle exclusively right : a nuclear - power spacecraft would only be good to go in space itself , not bouncing along on a strand of explosion in our blockheaded and fragile atmosphere . They even reprocess the concept of previous Skylab grid - floors , where cosmonaut could lock in and stabilize themselves with specially - form cleat . And hey , I , too , would side with tokenish former - timer astronaut Spurgeon Tanner in his declaration that he ’d rather get home glowing in the dark from fire up their radioactive engines with damaged shielding , then slowly freeze , starve , or suffocate by stay put while Earth in decimate .
Verdict : Plausible substitute future , if history had taken a different path .
Premise # 6 : The commission failed , splitting the comet in one-half so or else of one wallop , we now have two to worry about . Would we really be that bumblingly incompetent ?
Yup .
We bang our nuke , and somehow think they ’d be the solution to everything , but even carting the full world atomic stockpile into place in an asteroid - destruct / atomic - disarmament anti - apocalypse double - play ca n’t have the best the basic cathartic of momentum . Sure , we might be able to break pieces off a comet or asteroid , but that just means we have more pieces to bang into the planet and flat squash people instead of indirectly kill them through global firestorm , ejecta , dust in the upper ambiance , and the result climate chill and prolonged intense Greenhouse Effect .
If we actually require to save our major planet from obliteration - by - impact , we ’re live on to take a lot more warning and a set more lead - clock time to slowly spay its field through gravity - tugs , imbalanced solar pressure , embedded rockets , or a million other idea that are currently more fabrication than fact . fellate whoreson up will just lend to our problems .
Diamond encrusted drill bit? Check. Astronaut-drillers? Check. Cometary gravity strong enough to leave the drill platform at a strange, severe angle? Uh…
Re : the astronauts impersonate miner , I am totally unsurprised they could estimate out practice with half a year of mission training . It ’s unfortunate yetsadly not unprecedented in spaceflightthat they mixed up the metric and purple measurement systems . Even more probably , like every borehole geophysicist on the planet experiences finally , their probe got dispiritedly stuck in an inconvenient localization .
Verdict : Depressingly plausible — our puny nuke are useless .
premiss # 7 : Everywhere looks like Southern California , and the logistics of deportation are strangely round-eyed , almost as though envisioned by someone who has never live in the eastern United States .
Look , somehow Richmond , Virginia bourgeon hills , Missouri lost its wood , the journey from DC to Cape Code takes under 2 hours in labored , gridlock dealings , and it just keeps getting worse . I do n’t even care any longer .
Verdict : Implausible — but who actually cares about set anyway ?
assumption # 8 : The smallest comet fragment impacts the Atlantic Ocean off the easterly seaboard , trigger a massive tsunami that drench the coast .
A tsunami is a rapidly-rising wall of water that doesn’t look at all like the graceful cresting waves on tsunami warning signs.
Yes , the graphics are , indeed , lovely ! We get a gracious haulage - down of the trough come before the summit ( although , Dear Hollywood , the odds are 50/50 the crown will arrive first and our heroes will have no warning of their at hand doom … ) anda huge wall of rapidly - rise up pee that does n’t crest . But it ’s only one undulation . A real tsunami is a whole series of wave , like incredibly devastating ripples in pond triggered by a catastrophically huge pebble raffishly discard in by the Lord High Director of Impending Doom . Not only that , but the first wave is n’t necessarily the expectant one , specially since nasty constructive interference effects of advancing and retreating waves can spike that tsunami even higher .
The scale of an impact tsunami is far larger, but they still shoal by the same mechanics. Image credit:International Tsunami Information Center.
But you know what it really gets right ? Even though he never uses the term , President Beck successfully describes how a tsunami shoals as it get into ever - shallower water , bundle up into a steep , improbable mound . He does n’t inform us , or does n’t get it on , that a tsunami also slows down as they shoal . While that demon disperse at the speed of a jet airplane in open ocean , it slack down to highway speeds as it approaches shore . In some ways , it ’s almost , sort of , kinda , somewhat plausible a kid on a motorcycle with good unconditioned reflex and a hilly destination for a upright refuge might be able-bodied to out - tantalise a tsunami if he was very , very lucky and had a very good bike .
Verdict : Surprisingly plausible .
assumption # 9 : The astronauts give themselves to give the planet a last - minute reprieve , vaporizing the final , bigger comet - clump into puppies , rainbows , shoot stars , and pure joy . President Beck remains in authority despite ruthlessly give up his citizens to their doom , and speak rousingly of rebuilding in the backwash of catastrophe . Sure , a few hoi polloi died including our dauntless journalist , but a glad end like this is altogether plausible !
Ahahahahahhahahahahahahaha hah ah aha ha ha ha …
Wait , you ’re serious ?
Impending doom is such a romantic setting for newlywed teenage orphans.
Okay . So , all that comet - dust . It ’s still the same mass , just in bitty pieces now , correct ? That shit still causes problems when it enters the aura on that kind of scale of measurement . Worse , even a pathos - enhanced suicide - tend explosion of the same numeral of nuclear warhead that separate the comet before is n’t going to be able to totally decimate the comet to bite - sized pieces : some of those fragments are going to be legit city - destroy impactors scattering place destruction below . Shockwaves , airbursts , flash - sunburn , verbatim impact … No agency is this a Happily Ever After moment .
But ignore that and the repose of the forcible sciences : We ’ve just wipe out every major population center on the eastern seaside at the very least , and probably a caboodle more damage in all those ignorable strange - places around the rest of the Atlantic . Next , we ’re looking at a population that was leave anticipating the End of Days for calendar month , stripped of all Leslie Townes Hope , explicitly give up by their political leader , then somehow saved by the vagary of plot . Society is springy , but that ’s a monolithic shock to adopt that American culture will come out the other side still blab out praises of the red , white-hot , and blue . Whatever happens next , I ca n’t imagine it ’ll be pretty .
Verdict : Einstein - bendingly farfetched .
The Judgement
Deep Impact is a surprisingly plausible doomsday scenario , although verging on overly - optimistic at times . Slap some reddish filter on any light that comes near an stargazer , make the tsunami importantly more scary , and tote up in some post - revelatory excited Max collapse of social club , and you might have a evenhandedly realistic feel at what will take place if we keep delaying investing in asteroid detecting , trailing , and interception plans .
deep impact
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