Determined to look on the bright side of life, astronomers are claiming that mistaking a Russian spacecraft for an asteroid plummeting towards Earth and sure to cause chaos and destruction is actually proof that their technology works very well, thank you very much.
“The system is there to try to accurately assess an object,” says Mark Bailey, director of the Armagh Observatory in Northern Ireland… “If it’s going to hit, you need to work out when and where as quickly as possible. You don’t want them sitting on the data wondering whether it’s an asteroid or not,” Bailey told New Scientist.
Apparently, Mr. Bailey has never seen any disaster movie ever made and doesn’t know how these things are supposed to be done. Flickr image by James UK
Astronomers defend asteroid warning mix-up [via New Scientist]
