Forwarded from Lisa Lint (lisal@aiaa.org)
Subject: SGV Section AIAA January Dinner Meeting

Near-Earth Objects and the Chance of Collision with Earth

The average time between globally catastrophic impacts on Earth is long, around half a million years, but the consequences of such events are so enormous that the hazard must be taken seriously. Near-Earth Objects (NEOs) are being discovered at an increasing rate, thanks largely to search programs funded by NASA, but over half of the kilometer-and-larger objects remain undiscovered.

Orbits for the known objects have been projected several decades into the future to search for collision possibilities, and a few objects have been found to have impact chances on the order of one in a million. Additional tracking data for these objects has removed the chance of collision in all but one case.

Paul Chodas is a Research Scientist in the Solar System Dynamics group at JPL, where he has worked for 13 years after obtaining a Ph.D. from the University of Toronto. He develops techniques for determining orbits of comets and asteroids and predicting their trajectories. In 1994, he was responsible for predicting the times and locations of the Shoemaker-Levy 9 cometary impacts on Jupiter.

Wednesday, January 19, 2000
6 p.m. Social Hour, 7-9:30 Dinner and Program
new location: Beckham Place Restaurant, 77 West Walnut Street, Pasadena, CA
parking is free across the street at Parsons
$17 for AIAA Members ($20 without reservations or membership)
Non-Members are encouraged to attend!
For reservations or information, please contact
the AIAA Western Office at (800) 683-AIAA or lisal@aiaa.org