Using Time Series Analysis to Forecast Close Approaches to the Earth by Near-Earth Objects

If we are to be struck by an impact event resulting in human extinction, it would most likely occur in the Spring or Fall. If you were to ask 100 people what they believed the greatest risk to human civilization is I would bet the top 3 answers would be nuclear war, global pandemic and global warming/climate change. However, less than 10 years ago a meteor with a diameter of approximately 20 meters and a mass of 10,000 tons exploded 30 km over the city Chelyabinsk in Russia. Although there were no fatalities, the blast was estimated to have resulted in $30 million worth of damages and injured 1,500 people. About 100 years previously, in 1908, a meteor 50–60 meters in size exploded over Siberia with the power of a 12 megaton explosion which destroyed about 2,200 squared kilometers of forest.