Space is really big, even just in our own solar system. So how can astronomers be sure they’re looking in the right place at the right time to catch an asteroid, even when they don’t know it will be there? Is it just luck? Or is there some kind of educated guesswork going on?
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Well, the short answer is. They dont.
We’ve been very very lucky so far. Only very few asteroids are detected, since we can only watch so much of the sky at once. And even then funding is a huge problem since it’s not a problem thats very high in priority for governments even though the economic damage would far outweight just about any other funding goal. The russian Chelyabinsk meteor in 2013 for instance was tiny and caused damage to over 7000 houses despite it being incredibly far away from them basicly in the middle of nowhere.
And just recently one came from an absolute blind spot in the direction of the sun and surprised us. It was on the same day on which we were expecting a asteroid to come from the other side.
Yes, it is just luck.
No, its hard to say where they’re comming from so you cant exactly aim for them ahead of time. You just scan as much of the sky as possible, as many times as you can. This is why the Aricibo Obervatory being dismantled is such a loss. It was basicly our space radar for a lot of these things.
That said. Dont panic. Chances are slim we’ll get hit. If we do, it’s probably not a planet killer.
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