The HR Doctor Is In

Compiling a list of candidates for the award of "most horrific civilization-destroying scenario" is a sobering process. Accidental or deliberate nuclear explosions would rank high on the list. So would pandemics and drug-resistant superbugs. A rising "star" on the list would be natural catastrophes spurred on by global warming, such as super storms. The horror list certainly would include the potential for catastrophic volcanism and earthquakes, perhaps in Iceland or Yellowstone. A scary list, indeed.

However, there is one equally realistic horror story that has not yet captured much of the public's attention. It is a very real threat and one of which we should all become aware. It is the potential for catastrophic asteroid impact. We know this possibility is real because it has already wiped out most of the species of living things on earth.

There are millions of bodies of rock and ice moving around in the depths of the solar system. Most are tiny. Every day there are impacts on earth of a tiny fraction of these. We don't realize it because the atmosphere protects us. Larger asteroids on a collision course with Earth would not be stopped by the atmosphere. They could be city-destroying, nation-destroying or world-destroying depending on their mass and speed as they smack into our planet. The threat is very real more real than we appreciate since we have catalogued only a small fraction of the potential villains lurking out there.

Yet interestingly, we have the technology to defend ourselves, to detect and to destroy these killers, and the know-how to act.

Enter a thoughtful and forward-looking charity called the B612 Foundation. It is a nonprofit group creating the Sentinel Mission (visit www.sentinelmission.org). Sentinel would place in solar orbit a threat detection satellite far more advanced and far better located than our current Earth orbiting satellite systems.

Sentinel would detect and warn us of the danger of collision. In its six-and-a-half year lifespan, Sentinel cataloged 98 percent of the threatening asteroids. Detection satellites around the earth are limited in their detection value compared to placing a satellite in much farther orbit. Sentinel would detect many more distant threats than we currently can. These threats are unrecognizable if you're too close to the planet.

Early detection of threats means early warning. Just as with early warning of a disease like cancer, a precious window of time opens up for us to harness our technology to deflect incoming catastrophes. Time is the magic tool, which we do not yet possess because of limited detection capabilities.

No county government, despite the dedication of its public safety personnel and the technology of the emergency operations centers, can manage the aftermath of a large-scale super catastrophe. The Federal Emergency Management Agency would soon be impotent. The harm to the species and to a civil society could well return us to the Stone Age if we survived at all.

Take it from a career public servant, not to mention an amateur astronomer since childhood: invest the time to learn about the B612 Foundation and consider a donation. We can make something happen which government alone will not.

We would like to think that we are far smarter than the dinosaurs that were wiped out by an asteroid impact. However, by not acting on such a real threat one that we recognize and can do something about we may be demonstrating that we are really no smarter than a bunch of lizards.

Phil Rosenberg

The HR Doctor