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Article Excerpt
WHO can forget poor old Corporal Jones in Dads Army, with his constantrefrain of Dont panic!? Now, a book by two leading statisticians examines allthose issues that generate anxietyand advises which ones you really do need to fret about. Their ratings work outthe risk of an event as the likelihood of its happening multiplied by theimpact if it does. For the panic rating, events are scored on how real thethreat is, compared to how worried we have become.
? BEING HIT BY AN ASTEROID PUT April 13, 2029, in your diary. (Yes, its goingto be a Friday.) According to the space agency Nasa,thisisthedaywhentheEarthis most likely to be struck by a civilisation-destroying asteroid.
Odds of one in 45an unprecedented level of riskwerequotedthatwewillbehitbythe recentlydiscovered 2004 MN4, a 400-metre diameter chunk of rock orbiting the Sun.
Small asteroids reach us all the time, but burn up in the Earths atmosphere,where they can be seen as meteors or shooting stars.
But what is the real risk of one being large enough to wipe out Earth? Not onlywould it have to be immense, it would also have to have enough energy topenetrate our atmosphere. Above all, its orbit must coincide with that of theEarth which is most unlikely to happen.
AsDouglasAdamspointedoutinThe Hitchhikers Guide To The Galaxy, space is big, really...
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