Surviving Killer Asteroids

Astronomer Neil deGrasse Tyson, who visited the Writers Institute in 2004, discusses ways of coping with killer asteroids, today in Wired.

"Solar System debris rains down on Earth in vast quantities — more than a hundred tons of it a day. Most of it vaporizes in our atmosphere, leaving stunning trails of light we call shooting stars. More hazardous are the billions, likely trillions, of leftover rocks — comets and asteroids — that wander interplanetary space in search of targets." More.

Tyson came to Albany to discuss The Sky is Not the Limit: Adventures of an Urban Astrophysicist (2000), Tyson. In the memoir, he traces the arc of his remarkable life, from his beginnings as an eccentric African-American kid who loved to study the night sky from the roof of his Bronx apartment building, to his role as one of the most influential scientists in his field.