It isn’t every day that a crisis, a true crisis hits within astronomy. We’re not talking about a long range rover going missing in transit, although a government losing millions of dollars is never a good thing for the industry. Instead we’re talking about a true crisis, lives being put at stake. Unlike a lot of industries those of us who work in astronomy can’t simply ask for a really good set of wine gift baskets from friends and watch what unfolds, we are required to take action.
So what’s the worst scenario? Pretty easily it is a major asteroid heading toward Earth. We’re talking Armageddon style. No we wouldn’t be responsible for taking action, but before a government decided to try and take action we’d have to have some type of agreement of what really was about to happen. Finding that agreement under such heavy pressure wouldn’t be easy.
