Product Description
Could a giant asteroid or comet crash into the Earth and destroy life as we know it? Many astronomers who formerly discredited the risks are now convinced there is a grave danger. In Rogue Asteroids and Doomsday Comets, astronomer Duncan Steel explores the scientists' fascinating and often chilling findings.

Director of one of three global asteroid and comet search programs, Steel is one of the world's leading experts. He tells the intriguing story of the scientific detection work that pieced together mounting evidence to uncover a stunning history of impacts. Massive comet and asteroid impacts scarred our planet frequently in the past—a comet was almost surely responsible for the extinction of the dinosaurs. Recent advances in telescope tracking technology show at least 2,000 objects now orbiting the Earth that are large enough to hit with the force of a nuclear weapon. Based on the best calculations, it is certain that the Earth will sooner or later find itself on a disastrous collision course once again.

In the event of a collision, evidence suggests outcomes such as three-mile-high ocean waves capable of obliterating coastal communities worldwide, a massive conflagration and a cloud of dust and ash blocking all sunlight and making agriculture impossible. With consummate authority, Steel explains and evaluates these prospects and the plans researchers have proposed for the search and destruction of oncoming celestial bodies, including Edward Teller's provocative call for a nuclear bomb.

Rogue Asteroids and Doomsday Comets is a compelling account of the threat posed to life on Earth from outer space, and of scientists' response. Killer comets and asteroids populate the cosmos in greater numbers than we have ever imagined. But for the first time, humankind is in a position to prevent calamity. This book makes a compelling case that to waste that opportunity would be both perilous and foolhardy.

"A chilling and utterly convincing account of a cosmic menace that must not be ignored any longer. Duncan Steel writes with authority and credibility. This book is a welcome challenge to the scientific prejudice against catastrophism." —Paul Davies, author of The Mind of God

Evidence of Earth's encounters with killer comets and asteroids . . .

An enormous crater 180 kilometers across was recently identified in Mexico's Yucatan Peninsula. The asteroid that created it 65 million years ago must have been larger than 20 kilometers. Was this gargantuan collision the cause of a global environmental disaster that led to the extinction of the dinosaurs? Fossil evidence shows that 900f the terrestrial biomass was incinerated about the time of the asteroid's impact. Did an asteroid crash spark a fireball that literally saw the Earth go up in flames?

In 1908, a much smaller asteroid exploded in the atmosphere over the remote Tunguska region of Siberia. The blast, estimated at 20 megatons—2,000 times the power of the bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, leveled vast expanses of forest and ignited fires that burned out of control. The explosion's mighty thunderclap was audible over 400 miles away, and throughout Europe the night sky glowed unnaturally bright
Could both Stonehenge and the pyramids of Egypt have been constructed to observe and commemorate a period of phenomenal meteor storms and asteroid detonations produced by a burst of activity in the Taurid Complex 4,500 to 5,000 years ago? Author Duncan Steel examines the evidence indicating rogue asteroids and doomsday comets may have been behind these and other ancient phenomena.

CUSTOMER REVIEWS (Average Customer Rating: 4.0 based on 4 reviews)

Ignore speculation and you have a good book..

I liked the book, but do not rate it as highly as "Rain of Iron and Ice" by John S. Lewis and "Impact" by Gerrit L Verschuur. However, it is much better than "Fire on Earth" by John and Mary Gribben.
My chief reservation about Steel's work is that he seems easily drawn to flights of whimsy such as Clube's and Napier's contentions regarding Beta Taurid cometary impacts that have affected history on a mammoth scale. While these are captivating proposals, perhaps, there isn't enough hard scientific evidence for them clutter up what was otherwise a hitherto fine scientific presentation of a real problem by Steel. Up to the author's dalliance into the speculative, the book is a good read about a serious, overlooked, preventable threat. His admonitions should be taken seriously.
March 12, 2002

Craters

Duncan Steel is one of the best known advocates for a near Earth observation system, and he and others like him should be listened to. Unfortunately the book is not too great. It didn't hold my attention, partly because of the intrusion of some of his opinions. If nothing else is available on the topic, this could be an okay choice. See instead "Rain of Iron and Ice" by John S. Lewis

Related titles include "Night Comes to the Cretaceous" by James Lawrence Powell and "T Rex and the Crater of Doom" by Walter Alvarez.
December 18, 2000

Please create an audio abridged version ...

To the publisher I would appreciate it if the publisher could produce an audio adaptation of this book. I would love to listen to this while I drive to work and to let my 16 month old son listen to it as a bedtime story. My goal is to expose him to some of my favorite passions, maths, sciences, physics, geophysics, paleontology, astronomy, electronics, photonics, new science and discoveries etc. The more audio books you can produce of the above genre the more I will support you. Arnold D Veness
June 17, 1999

Death from Space! - sometime.

Three events in the past decade have caused a great deal of interest in objects around us in space. Giotto's encounter with Halleys Comet, Hubble Space Telescope pictures of the Shoemaker/Levy comet crashing onto Jupiter and lastly the naked eye sightings of the Hale/Bopp Comet we have enjoyed earlier in the year. Originally from Somerset, Duncan Steel now works at the Anglo-Australian Observatory and his book provides a very readable account of the nature and movements of these very varied objects.

Ever since the first pictures of other planets and in particular their moons arrived, studies have been made of their cratering records. Pictures from space have also been the main method of detecting craters but this time down on earth where plate tectonics, erosion, sediments or vegetation tend to erase them.

Astronomy and Geology linked up when cosmic impact events were suggested as possible cause or trigger for some of the major extinctions we find in the fossil record. The effects of both solar and cosmic cycles on all aspects of life on the planet are now widely studied.

Mr. Steel gives an account of a very bright meteor seen by many people in 1993 in New South Wales. When asked for an estimate of how soon it would before another such sighting to occur the answer was given in years. One week later, however, an object estimated to be 2-3 meters in size and traveling at 30Km/Sec exploded 18Km overhead with the amount of energy produced by a Hiroshima Bomb. Events such as these and the trail of impacts left on Jupiter show that objects in space are certainly not solitary. Lines of craters have been found on other moons in the system. Comet Hale/Bopp provided a spectacular sight a few months ago but for now the interest is in the debris and dust they and asteroids can leave behind often in highly eccentric trails across our orbit. Gravitational forces and solar wind affect the objects and the trails have a structure and it is the "busy" parts of the belt which give the peaks to meteor showers as we pass. The widely varying time scales which have been linked with extinctions and other cycles are the result of earth and solar system moving round the galaxy.

The possible effects of a large impact, global warming, ice ages, large fire storms or basalt floods have all been discussed elsewhere but the book considers several other theories. A large object landing in the ocean could cause a truly instant catastrophe.

This is the tsunami wave which can be caused by earthquakes or large undersea slope collapse. Islands in the middle of the Pacific can feel the effects of activity right across the ocean. The sloping continental shelves amplify the height of the waves and in low lying areas they can reach well in land. Observations of the cratering pattern on Mercury led to one theory where the shock waves from a large impact travel round the globe and fracture the crust on the opposite side. Reconstruction of the continents at the times of suggested impact events seems to make it possible to link basalt floods such as the Deccan traps with their "opposite" partner.

The remainder of the book deals with the problems involved first in detecting objects which may be a threat to the earth and also discusses what or how anything could be done about it. The pictures of S/L 9 described as a "string of pearls" as it approached Jupiter show just how much of a problem this could prove. For a book found

on the astronomy shelves in the library this one provided a very interesting read and shows that we on earth are not alone in space.
October 15, 1998

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