ATL Asteroid deflection strategies

Let's say that the Tunguska impact was much larger, or that for whatever reason fear of rocks from space becomes much more ingrained in the public consciousness. From 1950, what are the asteroid deflection strategies the Soviets and Yanks could develop, how much could they contribute to them, and what sort of butterflies this could have?
 
Let's say that the Tunguska impact was much larger, or that for whatever reason fear of rocks from space becomes much more ingrained in the public consciousness. From 1950, what are the asteroid deflection strategies the Soviets and Yanks could develop, how much could they contribute to them, and what sort of butterflies this could have?

The US would have fully developed NERVA as a get-to then change course of asteroid mover.
The problem of detecting asteroids in time would have led to more telescope systems (they can automate/improve them earlier, the technology isnt there, and its not really possible to drive it faster) in order to see them coming.

As long as you can get a few weeks warning, a NERVA system (with a ready launcher, or maintained in orbit) can deflect it easily.

An interesting possibility is a US-Russian (and probably other nations as well) cooperative effort - Russia supplies heavy launchers, US NERVA, put one or two into orbit and maintain them, or have them ready with a ready launcher on pad.
 
BlackWave,

A couple of things off the top of my pointy head:

- We'd have an earlier appreciation of the actual composition of asteroids. They're not "flying mountains", they're "flying gravel piles" instead. The ESA Mathilde flyby showed that that asteroid had a density less than styrofoam and and other probes to other asteroids have confirmed that result. A composition of this type actually precludes the usual idiotic Hollywood "Send A Big Bomb" "solution" as all you'll do is create lots of fragments which will still impact on the planet.

- We'd have more satellites more earlier looking "out" than looking "down" as we try to identify dangerous objects early enough to deal with them.

- We'd have more of a deep space capability either through NERVA or ion type drives. These drives would be necessary for the real solution to Earth impactors; parking an object near enough and soon enough to the asteroid enough to the asteroid to effect it's orbit. The objects would "yo-yo" above the asteroid, slowly dropping towards the surface until they reach a certain point and then gently thrusting back to their starting point.

- More launches to orbit and more of a manned presence in orbit to support the asteroid hunting sensor platforms and the stock of "yo-yos" dispatched to modify their orbits.

- More of an international effort in space as neither the US or USSR can fund such an effort alone.


Bill
 
As long as you can get a few weeks warning, a NERVA system (with a ready launcher, or maintained in orbit) can deflect it easily.
Say WHAT!?

Nerva is more efficient than LH2/Lox rockets, but less than twice. (800sec vs 450sec). To move a 1km^3 asteroid (say ~10^9 tonnes, 10^12 kg) to miss the earth (move the asteroid 10, 000 km 10^7 m (around 2x earth radius, need to be well clear)) in two weeks ~10^6 seconds, we need delta-v of 10m/s. Nerva is 800 seconds (call it 1000), so ~10^4m/s velocity. SO the mass of LH2 you need for the nerva is ~10^5 tonnes - or about 1000 Saturn V loads, once you got to the asteroid and matched courses. Figure 3-10 times that load into earth orbit.

All very back of the enveloppe, and it'd work a lot better with an asteroid 100m on a side. (actually, it would be very, very expensive with that size asteroid, but might possibly be doable. I was surprised. Still, not 'easily')
 
Say WHAT!?

Nerva is more efficient than LH2/Lox rockets, but less than twice. (800sec vs 450sec). To move a 1km^3 asteroid (say ~10^9 tonnes, 10^12 kg) to miss the earth (move the asteroid 10, 000 km 10^7 m (around 2x earth radius, need to be well clear)) in two weeks ~10^6 seconds, we need delta-v of 10m/s. Nerva is 800 seconds (call it 1000), so ~10^4m/s velocity. SO the mass of LH2 you need for the nerva is ~10^5 tonnes - or about 1000 Saturn V loads, once you got to the asteroid and matched courses. Figure 3-10 times that load into earth orbit.

All very back of the enveloppe, and it'd work a lot better with an asteroid 100m on a side. (actually, it would be very, very expensive with that size asteroid, but might possibly be doable. I was surprised. Still, not 'easily')

A 1km rock is actually a pretty big asteroid...

Deflection of course depends on the available time...and the size of the rock. Given a long time, or a small rock, you can deflect it.
Otherwise, you do the old fallback of a really impressive nuke, or a series ofcthem. Either it breaks up, or its deflected (depending on the composition)

The real problem isnt doing something about the rock, its seeing it coming in the first place...
 
Basically, they'd have the same asteroid deflection strategies that we have.

Wishful thinking.

So far, its working good.
 
Basically, they'd have the same asteroid deflection strategies that we have.

Wishful thinking.

So far, its working good.

With a much bigger budget and research base than OTL, I think I'm justified in saying that this probably wouldn't be the case in a more asteroid-paranoid world.
 
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