The European Commission funded Russian scientists to develop plans to save the world from rogue asteroids by blowing them up with nuclear weapons.
Scientists from the Russia’s top space research institute teamed up with missile and rocket engineers to look at ways of sending a warhead into space under a European Commission funded program called NEOShield.
“Work was distributed among various participants from different countries and organisations, and work on deflecting dangerous space objects with nuclear explosions was conducted by Russia” between 2012 and 2015, the Central Scientific Research Institute of Machine Building, part of the Russian space agency Roscosmos, said in a press release on Saturday.
The idea is that a nuclear explosion close to a comet or asteroid would burn up some of the object’s mass, in turn producing a jet-thrust effect which would change its orbit.
The Earth has suffered multiple large asteroid impacts in its history, including a six-mile wide object believed to have wiped out the dinosaurs when it crashed into what is now Mexico.
More recently, nearly 1,500 people were injured and 7000 buildings damaged when a 20 meter wide meteor exploded over the Russian city of Chelyabinsk in 2013.
Read more: EU, Russia may nuke asteroids - Telegraph
Scientists from the Russia’s top space research institute teamed up with missile and rocket engineers to look at ways of sending a warhead into space under a European Commission funded program called NEOShield.
“Work was distributed among various participants from different countries and organisations, and work on deflecting dangerous space objects with nuclear explosions was conducted by Russia” between 2012 and 2015, the Central Scientific Research Institute of Machine Building, part of the Russian space agency Roscosmos, said in a press release on Saturday.
The idea is that a nuclear explosion close to a comet or asteroid would burn up some of the object’s mass, in turn producing a jet-thrust effect which would change its orbit.
The Earth has suffered multiple large asteroid impacts in its history, including a six-mile wide object believed to have wiped out the dinosaurs when it crashed into what is now Mexico.
More recently, nearly 1,500 people were injured and 7000 buildings damaged when a 20 meter wide meteor exploded over the Russian city of Chelyabinsk in 2013.
Read more: EU, Russia may nuke asteroids - Telegraph
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