Chinese researchers believe they may have found the most effective way to destroy or deflect a large, Earth-threatening asteroid – by burying a nuclear bomb beneath its surface and exploding it.
The idea is to first slam a metal penetrator into the asteroid, digging a deep hole. A second spacecraft would then drop a nuclear bomb into the hole and blow it up, according to a team led by researchers at the China Academy of Launch Vehicle Technology in Beijing.
In simulations, a 3-megaton explosion – or around 200 Hiroshima bombs – could completely blast apart an asteroid about 100 metres (328 feet) across, the team reported in the Space: Science & Technology journal in May.
The researchers also found that burying the bomb 30 metres beneath the surface could more than triple the change in the asteroid’s speed compared with a shallow explosion, making it far more effective at pushing the rock off course.
The approach – reminiscent of the 1998 disaster film Armageddon but carried out entirely by uncrewed spacecraft – had lower technical complexity and better defence effectiveness than simply slamming a bomb into the asteroid, the researchers argued.
Instead of relying on a high-speed impact at a random spot, the two-step method allows engineers to choose where to bury the bomb and place it much deeper beneath the surface.
