It was around 65 million years back that a giant space rock collided with the earth and wiped off dinosaurs, then dominant, species on the earth. The collision of this doomsday asteroid triggered powerful earthquakes all across the planet, and the sudden climate shift destroyed the most powerful predators. Now, an expert has claimed that similar scenarios will happen in the future, and it may wipe out life from the earth's surface.
Asteroid hits are not confined to past
Robert Walker, a top mathematician believes that doomsday asteroids used to hit the earth at least once in every 100 million years. As a doomsday asteroid had hit around 65 million years back, Walker strongly believes that such an impact could happen in the near future.
"Yes. Ones as large as the Chicxulub impact every 100 million years or so on average - those are around 10km or over. The last one was 66 million years ago," wrote Walker on Quora.
Earlier, Dr Iain McDonald, a top space scientist had also predicted on the same lines, and he had made it clear that a doomsday asteroid will cause devastation on the earth one day or the other. As per McDonald, dreaded events like asteroid hits are not confined to the past, and it will continue in the future.
Asteroid Bennu adds up to the worries
As fears of a possible asteroid hit in the future loom larger, NASA is now busy studying asteroid Bennu using their OSIRIS Rex spacecraft. Several space experts believe that asteroid Bennu could hit the earth during its close flyby in 2135. It should be noted that asteroid Bennu is 500 meters in length, and it is traveling across space at an incredible speed.
Considering the size and velocity at which this asteroid is traveling, experts believe that any possible impact with Bennu could trigger devastation on a global scale, and the world will be pulled to a state of nuclear winter for many years.
