Asteroids Aff
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ARECIBO GOODArecibo is key—alternatives would be more expensive ROHRABACHER 2007 – (Dana, Congressman, November 8, Dr. Green received his Ph.D. in Space Physics from the University of Iowa in 1979 and began working in the Magnetospheric Physics Branch at NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center (MSFC) in 1980. At Marshall, Dr. Green developed and managed the Space Physics Analysis Network, which provided many scientists, all over the world, with rapid access to data, other scientists, and specific NASA computer and information resources NEAR-EARTH OBJECTS (NEOS)-STATUS OF THE SURVEY PROGRAM AND REVIEW OF NASA'S 2007 REPORT TO CONGRESS, http://frwebgate.access.gpo.gov/cgi-bin/getdoc.cgi?dbname=110_house_hearings&docid=f:38057.pdf)//DT When we are talking about Arecibo, I want to, of course, recognize the hard work that Congressman Fortuno is actually putting into this effort. It is a heroic effort. I am very pleased to be assisting him. But of course, we are not trying to do anybody any favors here. This isn't an issue of doing anyone a favor. First and foremost, the Arecibo telescope is doing work currently that would cost us more, even outside of the area of Near-Earth Objects. Even outside the area of Near-Earth Objects, the Arecibo telescope is doing work that would be more costly to do if, for example, we would send satellites. I understand we sent a mission to Venus that cost a certain amount of money, but the actual images that we got back from Arecibo were better than sending the probe up to Venus. Now, how much did that cost us? I mean, it probably cost us enough to keep Arecibo going for a decade. And clearly, also, when you look at the shutdown costs, which has been mentioned here, if you take all of that together, well, you could probably put that in the bank, and the interest on that money would probably keep the Arecibo telescope going. And this exemplifies sort of the screwball nature of the way we do business up here on Capitol Hill sometimes. And if we let this asset be set aside and closed down, it would be a tragedy, but also, as I say, very symbolic of the fact that we can't even do our job in Capitol Hill enough to take a very cost-effective asset, and something that is doing a mission that is vitally important to our security, that we can't even get ourselves together enough to get a limited amount of money to keep that project going. So, I think this is very symbolic, and that we should all be working together on this, and we are working on this. GOLDSTONE GOODGoldstone is a key radar system—no matching capabilities will be developed if it is cancelled NRC 2010 (National Research Council Committee to Review Near-Earth Object Surveys and Hazard Mitigation Strategies, “Defending Planet Earth: Near-Earth Object Surveys and Hazard Mitigation Strategies,” http://www.nap.edu/catalog.php?record_id=12842) The Goldstone Solar System Radar, located in the Mojave Desert in southern California, is part of NASA’s Deep Space Network (DSN) and is operated by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory under contract with NASA. Comprising a fully steerable 70-meter-diameter antenna that can transmit 500 kilowatts of waves with a length of nearly 4 centimeters, this radar has a significant capability for observing echoes from NEOs. It can see approximately 80 percent of the total sky over the course of a day (i.e., every part north of −35° latitude). The Goldstone antenna’s primary mission is spacecraft communications, and it is available for astronomy observations only a few percent of its time. Goldstone is the only one of NASA’s three 70-meter telescopes (the others are in Spain and Australia) equipped with a high-power transmitter. The long-term future of Goldstone is uncertain; the DSN is considering decommissioning all of its 70-meter telescopes after 2015 and switching to an array of 34-meter-diameter telescopes. Whether a radar capability comparable to the present Goldstone capabilities would continue is unclear. RADAR PLUS OPTICAL KEYRadar and optical systems are insufficient by themselves SCHWEICKART et al 2008 (Russel L., Bachelor of Science in Aeronautical Engineering, MIT Master of Science in Aeronautics and Astronautics, MIT, Association of Space Explorers International Panel on Asteroid Threat Mitigation, “Asteroid Threats: A Call For Global Response”, http://www.space-explorers.org/ATACGR.pdf)//DT Asteroid impacts occur on both the daylight and night sides of the Earth in roughly equal numbers. While there are exceptions, asteroids impacting on the sunlit hemisphere appear to approach the Earth from the direction of the Sun, while those impacting at night appear to approach from the anti-Sun direction. As a result, while ground-based optical telescopes can observe the approach of night impactors, they cannot (due to solar glare), be used to detect and track those close to impact on the day side From the daylight hemisphere, NEO detection and tracking are restricted to radar telescopes 7 6 Generally, any action reducing the consequences of a threatened NEO impact. It usually refers to those actions short of physical deflection of a NEO (e.g. evacuation). 7 A radio telescope which has the capability of active radio transmission, used to obtain precision tracking of NEOs. Radar tracking complements optical tracking and, when available, can significantly improve predictions of NEO orbits. , which are insensitive to the bright sky. Furthermore, while optical telescopes can detect and track the smallest NEOs of concern from 1 to 6 months before impact, radar systems with their limited range can only “see” objects this size within 3 to 6 days of impact, provided the operators know precisely where to look. Thus, for an impactor approaching from the sunlit side, there will be a maximum of 3-6 days of warning time for the evacuation of a potentially large target zone. Even that minimal warning would be available only for those asteroids detected on a previous close pass by the Earth; that earlier tracking would provide us with the predicted impact time and direction of approach necessary for aiming our radar telescopes. Because radar observatories have small fields of view and cannot view the entire sky, an undetected asteroid approaching Earth from the daylight side will give us little or no warning. 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