It’s the ultimate doomsday scenario: Astronomers spot an enormous miles-wide asteroid headed for a collision course with Earth. An impact with our planet means a fiery goodbye to civilization—and life—as we know it, and there are only a few short weeks to rally together a plucky group of oil drillers the citizens of the world to somehow fight this apocalyptic threat.

Fortunately, it’s doubtful we’ll ever be faced with this kind of sudden Armageddon. NASA, other government space agencies, and astronomers across the world have a pretty solid way of tracking huge, civilization-destroying asteroids, mapping their trajectories many years or decades in advance before they might head our way. Such ample warning would give us more than enough time to prepare some kind of deflection strategy. Read more