Asteroid: The Doomsday Rock

It shot from a hot white sky with absolutely no warning. On Friday, June 14th 2002, an asteroid the size of a football field made one of the closest ever recorded approaches to Earth. Asteroid 2002MN was travelling at more than 10 km/s (23,000 mph) when it passed Earth at a distance of about 120,000 km (75,000 miles) -- less than a third the distance to the Moon.

Because it came from the direction of the Sun, bright light blinded the world's observatories. This tumbling bullet from space hurtled past Earth completely unseen until three days later when it moved out of the Earth's shadow and into the evening sky going away.

Had it hit the Earth it could have caused devastation on a scale similar to the asteroid impact in Tunguska, Siberia in 1908 when 2000 square kilometres of forest were flattened in a matter of seconds. Had that chunk of space debris hit Moscow instead--or London or Hong Kong--the loss of life would have been staggering. Imagine the horror of Ground Zero in Manhattan multiplied many times across the entire city of New York. If the world's best and brightest scientists are right, an impact like this is not just likely--it's inevitable.

Or is it? Asteroid! The Doomsday Rock tells the story of a multi-national team of gifted scientists who believe and intend to prove that the world's largest environmental disaster is entirely preventable.

92 mins

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