International or World Asteroid Day aims to raise public awareness about the hazards of an asteroid impact and to inform the general public about the crisis actions, including urgent communications and the use of technology, to be taken at the global level in case of a credible near-Earth object threat.
Recently, I watched a hit Netflix film, 'Don't Look Up,' which satirically showed the present condition of the human species with regards to its obsessions with taking selfies, being the latest social media sensation and living some kind of superficial existence without confronting or facing the real multitude of issues, which are troubling this planet in the present time like climate change, poverty, food shortages, a moral, ethical crisis and many more issues like population control. It was a clever MacGuffin (word coined by the legendary filmmaker, Alfred Hitchcock) by the filmmakers to use the analogy of a gigantic or ginormous lethal asteroid hitting the Earth to indicate how the majority of human beings on Earth are completely apathetic to the state and condition of the very soil on which they daily stand and exploit for their own personal profit.
Therefore, I was very pleasantly surprised when I got to know that the United Nations has specifically dedicated a day to the possibility of an asteroid hurtling towards planet Earth and to raise awareness on what to do in case this grim crisis ever appears to the human species in our lifetimes and for the coming generations as well.
History and Significance of International Asteroid Day
International Asteroid Day aims to raise public awareness about the hazards of an asteroid impact and to inform the general public about the crisis actions, including urgent communications and the use of technology, to be taken at the global level in case of a credible near-Earth object threat. Following a meteor impact in Chelyabinsk, Russia. June 30 was declared as International Asteroid Day by United Nations General Assembly per the resolution of A/RES/71/90. This was proposed by the Association of Space Explorers and supported by the Committee for the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space (COPUOS).
What are Asteroids and Near Earth Objects?
An Asteroid is a celestial body that keeps moving in the universe. They are smaller in size than planets and larger than meteorites. They are mostly found in the asteroid belt between the region of Mars and Jupiter. Asteroids can be understood as minor planets that did not develop at the time of the birth of the Solar System. Asteroids are also known as rocks left over from the Big Bang and there may be several hundred thousand asteroids that hold the secrets of the early universe that are still undiscovered. At the same time, many people also call an asteroid or asteroid as a meteor body, but only when an asteroid survives after circling the Sun, if it falls on the Earth, is it called a meteorite.
Near-Earth objects (NEOs) represent potentially catastrophic threats to our planet. NEO is an asteroid or comet, which passes close to the Earth's orbit. According to NASA’s Center for NEO Studies, there are over 16 000 Near Earth Asteroids discovered. The Tunguska asteroid event in Siberia, Russian Federation, on 30 June 1908, was the Earth's largest asteroid impact in recorded history.
June 30th: The Tunguska Impact
June 30 marks the anniversary of the Tunguska impact of 1908 when a burning meteorite fell from space on the morning of June 30, 1908, in a dense forest area on the banks of the Podkmenaya Tunguska River in Siberia, Russia. 80 million trees were destroyed in a forest area of 2,150 square kilometers due to the meteorite fall. At the same time, scientists have not been able to find out its secret since then. Apart from this, until now, no one has any information about how this incident exactly happened. Even today, scientists are still researching and investigating this unsolved mystery.
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