from reel to real
Inspired by five words, or is it six, in the 1998 blockbuster Armageddon — a movie about an asteroid the size of Texas on course to destroy Earth in 18 days (and a team of deep core drillers sent to break the asteroid in two) — I wondered whether there were any quantifiable clues in …
Last year I started digging around for space rocks — movies about space rocks — to compile a list of every asteroid and comet disaster movie ever made, from the very first silent, black and white offering in 1916, to the major blockbusters that launch at us every special effect that digital mastery can conjure …
Continue reading "Every Asteroid and Comet Disaster Movie Ever Made"
Apparently, if you smell a fresh meteorite it smells like sulphur, according to reports about the Tagish Lake meteorite and the aroma that filled the air during its fall in 2000. And the Aguas Zarcas meteorite that fell in Costa Rica in 2019 has been said to smell of compost, vanilla and Brussels sprouts, depending …
It's the end of the year and one particular tabloid newspaper is again warning us that it could soon be the end of the world — yes, asteroid 2019 AE3 is in our vicinity and the apocalypse is coming. In keeping with the tabloid drama, below is a list of all the film and TV …
Continue reading "80 Movies and TV Shows Featuring Earth-Threatening Asteroids and Comets"
So there's another apocalyptic asteroid warning in the tabloid news headlines. The lead scaremongerer in the UK is the Daily Express, who started out playfully alerting us to asteroids that will skim by Earth in the coming days. It didn't take long for a war of the digital world to start warning of swarms of …
I once read a quote in a conference abstract that stated the paper had been written to serve as “a historical guide to the asteroid literature for the perplexed”. That quote aptly sums up my desire for writing a piece on the history of asteroid classification and taxonomies, and the schemes currently in use. When …
More than 100 years have passed since the first film was shown in movie theatres that depicted events in the run up to a rock from space striking the Earth — although in that case it was a comet rather than an asteroid. That movie, a silent film called The End of the World released …
Continue reading "Making an Impact: Lights, Camera and Asteroid!"
Many people will remember the day in 2013 when one asteroid stole the limelight from another. On 15 February 2013, all eyes of astronomers were on the close approach of a 30 metre-sized Apollo asteroid 367943 Duende (then known as 2012 DA14). The asteroid was not expected to be visible to the naked eye. Nor …
Continue reading "Real and Simulated Asteroid and Comet Impacts"
It’s a dilemma universally acknowledged in Hollywood that the makers of asteroid and comet disaster movies must ignore the laws of physical science and make events look the way moviegoers expect from their own experience on Earth, otherwise they won't believe it. And so asteroids and comets are called meteors, meteoroids and meteors are called …