La NASA contra el bulo del asteroide de 400 metros

La agencia espacial niega que la roca cercana a la Tierra recién descubierta por un observatorio ruso suponga una amenaza, como han dicho algunos medios

I got this article from the Newspaper ABC, it was publicized the 10^th December 2014. http://www.abc.es/ciencia/20141210/abci-nasa-contra-bulo-asteroide-201412101124.html

Summary

The last 27th October, a group of scientists from Russia were warned about an enormous asteroid, which seemed to be getting closer and closer to the Earth. But when NASA knew about it, started to investigate this case and discovered it actually wasn’t true.

Glossary

1) Master-II en Kislovodsk: astronomical observatory in Kislovodsk, Russia. It is based at the Kislovodsk Solar Station of the Pulkovo Observatory of the Sternberg Astronomical Institute.

2) Space rocks: a space rock is like an asteroid, which is a minor planet.

Critical review

In my view, this kind of things should not happen when talking about science, and mostly talking about an asteroid that could impact with the Earth and cause an enormous disaster. In this case the astronomers from Master-II en Kislovodsk, in Russia, made an important mistake. I addition, everyone knows about NASA, and if someone from NASA says this theory isn’t right, everyone will believe this person.

Of course it is possible to be mistaken with a theory or to have made an error when calculating something, but I have always thought that science is team work, so how could an entire group of high-qualified astronomers be wrong?

In conclusion, I think that we should not have to “play” with things like that, because someday it will happen in real life and we won’t be prepared for that. Master-II en Kislovodsk made a mistake warning people about an inexistent problem, but what happens if the problem is that they are not warning us about a real important problem, which could be an asteroid impacting to Earth? Well, in this case we should thank NASA again for the great job those people are doing!

 

Written by Claudia Maldonado