Top scientists demand action to avoid civilization-ending asteroid hit

Conspiracy theorists have long been claiming that a civilization-threatening asteroid might be on a collision course with the Earth. Now, a team of renowned scientists is planning to raise concerns about these potentially dangerous space rocks at an international conference in Vienna.

Although experts have rubbished claims of Earth getting hit by a huge asteroid that killed the dinosaurs, scientists believe a lot of Near-Earth objects (NEO) have the capability of causing destruction at regional levels.

These scientists claimed that at three dangerous space objects have exploded in our planet's atmosphere in the past 100 years, and there are possibilities of such events happening in the future.

"Governments around the world must realize that NEOs pose a serious, even cataclysmic, threat to human civilization and that action must be taken now to identify levels of risk and develop the technology to protect this and future generations. The planets of the solar system have a long and violent history of collisions with extra-terrestrial bodies such as asteroids and comet nuclei. On earth several of these impacts have been large enough to cause major environmental changes and mass extinctions" said Jay Tate, a scientist at Asgardia, Express.co.uk reports.

Besides, NASA recently released image of a meteor which appeared over the Bering Sea on December 18 but went unnoticed until a few months. The explosion generated 173 kilotons of energy which is ten times the energy of the atomic bomb that wiped out Hiroshima in World War II.

It is said to be the most powerful explosion after the meteorite that burst over the Russian town of Chelyabinsk in 2013. The 440 kiloton explosion left around 1,500 people injured.

After understanding the grave consequences of NEOs, NASA is said to be developing a planetary defense weapon which will be able to alter the trajectory of the space rocks tha might be hurtling towards the Earth.