Every Fridaylive, From 21h (for Brasília time), airs the Space Look Programin the Digital Look on youtube. The episode of last Friday (20) (which you check here) Repercussed History of Asteroid day – The date that is a milestone in public awareness of the study of asteroids and the importance of defending Earth of possible future collisions.
Asteroid Day’s global event coordinator, Saulo Machadotold the events that gave rise to the date and how the celebration arrived in Brazil. Passionate about astronomy and scientific dissemination, Machado works as a business administrator in Fortaleza, Ceará, is the founder of the Astronomical Event Support Group (GAEA) and organizes Asteroid Day events in observatories, planetary and astronomy groups across the country.
Impact warned the world
In 2013, a meteor hit the city of Chelyabinskin Russiaand shocked the world. “It was a very significant impact. It was an asteroid about 18 meters in diameter, which exploded approximately 30 kilometers above the surface with energy equivalent to 33 Hiroshima pumps”Explained Marcelo Zurita, astronomer and presenter of the space gaze.
Millions of fragments spread throughout the city. The Sonic explosion broke glass windows, knocked down walls and resulted in an damage in the order of 30 million dollars. Videos of the disaster rolled the globe through social networks.
It was after this event that the filmmaker Grigorj Richters He decided to change the course of his film about the fall of an asteroid in London. He called the doctor in Astrophysics and Queen guitarist, Brian Mayto be your scientific consultant and compose the soundtrack of the feature film. The production went to theaters with the name of 51 Degrees North (51 degrees North, a reference to the longitude of the English capital in the coordinate system).
The presentation of the film took place in 2014, at the event Stamus – A celebration that brings together astronomy and music, created by Brian May. During the recordings and conversations of the exhibition, the duo conceived the idea of a date to make the danger of the fall of asteroids aware.
Richters and May then contacted the B612 Foundation, a group of scientists dedicated to protecting land from the possible impact of space objects. The institution gave the guidelines, set up the panel of experts and together scheduled for December 3, 2014 a press conference to announce the Asteroid day.
06/30: a date to be remembered
During the loose event, the expert team defined three objectives:
- Employ technology available to detect and track space objects near Earth through collaboration between governments, private entities and philanthropic organizations
- Increase the rate of discovery of potentially hazardous asteroids by 100 times, aiming to detect and track 100,000 space bodies near Earth per year within ten years
- Adopt globally asteroid day on June 30.
The choice of June 30 is a reference to the Tunguska 1908When a meteor hit the region of the same name in Siberia, Russia, and destroyed the surrounding environment. “They were 2150 square kilometers of devastated forest in the Tunguska region. It would fit the whole city of São Paulo in this area and space left, ”explained Zurita.
Seismic stations in Europe They were able to detect the tremors, which were equivalent to a magnitude 5 earthquake on the Richter scale. Fluctuations in atmospheric pressure were strong enough to be captured from the Briton.
Only three people died, but the damage to the surrounding populations was giant. He was considered the Greater terrestrial impact on recent history. Therefore, the date has been selected for awareness of the impacts that the fall of an asteroid may have in populations close to the risk zone and for all humanity.
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How did the event arrive in Brazil?
After the December 2014 press conference, the duo defined Asteroid Day’s first celebration for June 2015. Several international groups joined the project, totaling about 90 events around the world.
In Brazil, the Astronomical Study and Observation Center José Brazilio de Souzain Florianópolis, was a pioneer to celebrate the date. The group was the only one to hold an event in national lands in the year of launch.
The number of events grew in 2016, when the United Nations (UN) recognized June 30 as the International Asteroid Day. “This gave an unparalleled projection to Asteroid Day. Richters began to seek national coordinators in various countries to expand the number of events worldwide,” Machado said.
In 2017, the number of celebrations on national soil had a significant increase. “There were almost 400 events in the world and 114 in Brazil. We started with one, went to three and jumped to 114, ”commented the coordinator.
In 2024, the remarkable amount of celebrations remained and the Brazil was for the eighth year in a row with the country with the largest number of Asteroid Day events in the world. In addition, it was also the first to overcome the 300 event mark in just one year.
Now Saul encourages the elaboration of events and activities related to asteroid day. Node official website From the institution, it is possible to find didactic materials, such as 3D models of asteroids and informative posters. For the future, the coordinator expects a more conscious world about the danger of the fall of these objects and the importance of planetary defense.
“Our intention is to get more and more adhesions so that asteroids and planetary defense can be issues a family to talk at the dinner table,” concluded Machado.
