Book 14: Fire in the Sky: Cosmic Collisions, Killer Asteroids, and the Race to Defend Earth by Gordon L. Dillow - 267 pages
Description from bookdepository.co.uk:
Combining history, pop science, and in-depth reporting, a fascinating account of asteroids that hit Earth long ago, and those streaming toward us now, as well as how we are preparing against asteroid-caused catastrophe.
One of these days, warns Gordon Dillow, the Earth will be hit by a comet or asteroid of potentially catastrophic size. The only question is when. In the meantime, we need to get much better at finding objects hurtling our way, and if they're large enough to penetrate the atmosphere without burning up, figure out what to do about them.
We owe many of science's most important discoveries to the famed Meteor Crater, a mile-wide dimple on the Colorado Plateau created by an asteroid hit 50,000 years ago. In his masterfully researched Fire in the Sky, Dillow unpacks what the Crater has to tell us. Prior to the early 1900s, the world believed that all craters-on the Earth and Moon-were formed by volcanic activity. Not so. The revelation that Meteor Crater and others like it were formed by impacts with space objects has led to a now accepted theory about what killed off the dinosaurs, and it has opened up a new field of asteroid observation, which has recently brimmed with urgency. Dillow looks at great asteroid hits of the past and spends time with modern-day asteroid hunters and defense planning experts, including America's first Planetary Defense Officer.
Satellite sensors confirm that a Hiroshima-scale blast occurs in the atmosphere every year, and a smaller, one-kiloton blast every month. While Dillow makes clear that the objects above can be deadly, he consistently inspires awe with his descriptions of their size, makeup, and origins. At once a riveting work of popular science and a warning to not take for granted the space objects hurtling overhead, Fire in the Sky is, above all, a testament to our universe's celestial wonders.
Thoughts:
This is a highly readable account of the history of asteroid collisions with the Earth and what we are doing to spot them and stop them. This book was a gift from my parents; I had spotted it while searching for space related books, as part of my research for both my PhD and my novel series (which includes an asteroid impact). It certainly fell within the realms of my subject matter so I added it to a list of books my parents could buy me for my birthday. I didn't realise at the time that this book talks extensively about Meteor Crater in Arizona, a place my family stumbled across while driving from Flagstaff to the New Mexico border. I kind of wish I could go back to Meteor Crater now having read this book, but there's the little issue of a global pandemic! Anyway, Dillow's book (he's a journalist, not a scientist, which means the book isn't overly technical, and is quite funny) starts with Meteor Crater, unpacking the long history of asteroids, meteors and comets, and the struggle for science and the public to take the issue seriously. Dillow then talks about an event I'd actually forgotten about - the 1994 impact of Jupiter by a comet. I was only 7 at the time, but I distinctly remember hearing about it. I however didn't realise the impact that this event had on public understanding for the need for tracking of Near Earth Objects (comets, asteroids and meteors that could actually hit us). The fact that there still remains a 'giggle factor' when it comes to this subject really disappoints me, as does the old adage 'why spend money on this with all the problems on Earth' but then I think I'm in the minority in understanding the benefits space exploration and research provides to the Earth. Perhaps the most interesting chapter for me was the one on how we could destroy an incoming asteroid. I actually wrote an essay during my masters degree on how we should have nukes in space for the purposes of planetary defence - at the time, while struggling to find academic material, I'd started to read a lot about alternative forms of protection, particularly gravity tractors, and I'd kinda got the idea that gravity tractors were a more likely solution than nukes - I'd even started considering how this fit with my novel series' asteroid collision. But Dillow outlines some of the issues with this, particularly around time, and our Earthly habit of dithering. It’s certainly food for thought. Overall, I found this to be a deeply fascinating, very readable book - if you want technical details, it might not be for you, but as an introduction to a really important topic, it serves its purpose well. Thoroughly enjoyable!
Currently reading:
Journey to the West by Cheng-En Wu - 673 pages
The Truth of Different Skies by Kate Ling - 369 pages
Dr Space Junk vs the Universe: Archaeology and the Future by Alice Gorman - 282 pages
And coming up:
The Second Chronicles of Thomas Covenant: Volume 3: White Gold Wielder by Stephen Donaldson – 500 pages
The Odyssey by Homer – 324 pages
Why Young Men: The Dangerous Allure of Violent Movements and what we can do about it by Jamil Jivani - 255 pages
relieved
tired
