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A2 – Russia Solves Your Aff




Russia’s space chief got his facts wrong, he was only referring to a single asteroid that has a zero probability of hitting us, and his sensationalism killed Russian funding for asteroid deflection


O'Neill 1-2-10 (Ian, PhD Solar Physics, “Much Ado About Apophis,” 1-2-10, http://www.astroengine.com/?p=6989)

Apophis is a 300 meter wide asteroid that caused a stir back in 2004. When NASA discovered the near-Earth asteroid (or NEO), it appeared to be tumbling in our direction Armageddon-style and the initial odds for a 2029 impact were 1-in-37. Understandably, people got scared, the media went nuts and astrophysicists were suddenly very interested in space rock deflection techniques. Fortunately for us, NASA has downgraded the threat to a zero (note zero) chance of Apophis bumping into us in 2029, and lowered the risk of a follow-up impact in 2036 from a 1-in-45,000 chance to a 1-in-250,000 chance. It’s important to note that NASA didn’t just pull these numbers out of a hat; the space agency has been tracking Apophis intently since its discovery, plotted its position and projected its location to a very high degree of precision. The more we watch Apophis, the more the world’s scientists are convinced that the asteroid poses a very tiny risk to life on Earth. In fact, giving anything a 1-in-250,000 chance of happening is more of a courtesy than a ‘risk.’ Granted, we’re talking about a global catastrophe should Apophis hit, but would you ever bet on those kinds of odds? Apparently, the Russian space agency thinks it’s more of a game of Russian Roulette than NASA thinks. “I don’t remember exactly, but it seems to me it could hit the Earth by 2032,” said Anatoly Perminov, the head of Roscosmos, on December 30, 2009. “People’s lives are at stake. We should pay several hundred million dollars and build a system that would allow to prevent a collision, rather than sit and wait for it to happen and kill hundreds of thousands of people.” Wait a minute. Does Perminov know something NASA doesn’t? Is he even referring to Apophis? You know, the same asteroid NASA has calculated that has a cat in hell’s chance of causing bother in 2036? And what’s this about the year 2032? Just for the record, Perminov is indeed referring to Apophis, but he got the date wrong (Apophis does not make a flyby in 2032). Perminov also puts a price on saving hundreds of thousands of people… “several hundred million dollars” should do it, apparently. On the one hand I’m impressed that Roscosmos is calling for some kind of anti-asteroid shield, but on the other, Perminov’s concern is terribly misplaced (and potentially damaging). His statement sounds as if he’s only just heard about Apophis and then thrown into a press conference unprepared, then asked what he’s going to do about this impending doom. Naturally, in that situation he would have blurted out the first thing that popped into his head: We need to save the world! However, this isn’t the first time he’d heard about Apophis. Boris Shustov, the director of the Institute of Astronomy under the Russian Academy of Sciences, tried to repair the damage pointing out that Perminov was just using Apophis as a “symbolic example, there are many other dangerous objects we know little about.” However, saving the world from a theoretical “dangerous object” that may or may not hit us for the next few hundred /thousand/million years is less likely to get funding that an imminent 2032… sorry, 2036 impact. Although Perminov might sound reasonable in asking for asteroid deflection funding, using sensationalist means to try to leverage funding only serves to make the same funding hard to come by.

Russia’s space chief is not credible


Siemaszko12-31-9 (Corky, staff New York Daily News, “Astro’s Asteroid Fear Soars,” lexis)

THE HEAD OF RUSSIA'S space agency either knows something we don't - or there's something in his Tang. Anatoly Perminov stoked up some hysteria yesterday as he sounded the alarm about an asteroid called Apophis that is hurtling in the general direction of Earth. "People's lives are at stake," Perminov told a Russian news agency. "We should pay several hundred million dollars and build a system that would . . . prevent a collision, rather than sit and wait for it to happen and kill hundreds of thousands of people." Never mind that NASA has already placed the odds of the asteroid slamming our planet in 2036 at an extremely remote 1-in-250,000. Perminov said he heard from a scientist that the 850-foot asteroid "will surely collide with the Earth in the 2030s."

A2 Russia Solves: Russia Will use NW

Russians want to use nuclear missiles.


Russia & CIS General Newswire ’06 (Russia & CIS General Newswire, 11/28/06, “Nuclear missiles may be used to counter asteroids, meteorites,” 6/22/10, LexisNexis, MLK)
Deputy head of the Russian Federal Space Agency Vitaly Davydov does not rule out that mankind may team up to counter asteroids and meteorites and use nuclear missiles to this end. "Humankind may use nuclear missiles to counter the threat of asteroids," Davydov said, commenting on the Federal Space Agency's plans to predict and counter asteroids and meteorites, which might collide with the Earth. According to Davydov, the Russian Federal Space Agency does not have specific programs on countering asteroids and meteorites. "Nevertheless, we will work on the problem," Davydov said. According to him, the threat cannot be ignored, since a single meteorite can throw the mankind several centuries or even millenia back.

Russia plans to use missiles in case of an asteroid threat


Russia and CIS General Newswire ’11 (Russia and CIS General Newswire, 4/26/11, “New Russian missiles, "Tsar bomb" could help counter asteroids – academician,” 6/23/11, LexisNexis, MLK)
Russia's know-how could be used to counter threats posed to the Earth by asteroids, Academician Andrei Kokoshin, who is also a deputy of the Russian State Duma, told Interfax-AVN on Tuesday. "The Angara new missile will become an important component of Russia's space-based means. Using its new delivery vehicles, Russia is able to make a serious contribution, for example, to the fight against the asteroid threat, which in recent years has been assessed by scientists as considerably higher than in previous decades," Kokoshin said. The results of a recent session held by the board of the Russian Academy of Sciences and the Energia space rocket corporation have "shown that certain plans have already been formulated in our country to build space stations that could help prevent large asteroids and meteorites from colliding with the Earth," he said. "The Soviet experience of designing super-powerful warheads, such as the 50-megatonne RDS-202 bomb, which was blown up near Novaya Zemlya in 1961, could come in handy" while combating asteroid threats at a large distance from the Earth, Kokoshin said.




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