# If New York City is destroyed, what will the headlines say? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [December 21, 2021, 3:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-new-york-city-is-destroyed-what-will-the-headlines-say/956394 "2021-12-21T03:14:19Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 11\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![Inigo\_Montoya](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/inigo_montoya/32/124_2.png) [@Inigo\_Montoya](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Inigo_Montoya)\ **Post date:** [December 23, 2021, 11:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-new-york-city-is-destroyed-what-will-the-headlines-say/956394/81 "2021-12-23T23:03:57Z")
Asteroid allowed to strike NYC unimpeded. Astronomers have finally solved the problem of urban blight. ---
**Author:** ![Riemann](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/riemann/32/3133_2.png) [@Riemann](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Riemann)\ **Post date:** [December 23, 2021, 11:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-new-york-city-is-destroyed-what-will-the-headlines-say/956394/82 "2021-12-23T23:33:18Z")
_USA Today_ - Updated: The Ten Worst Place To Live In The USA 1. Detroit 2. Cleveland 3. Phoenix 4. Las Vegas 5. Newark 6. New York City … ---
**Author:** ![Dr.Strangelove](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dr.strangelove/32/6613_2.png) [@Dr.Strangelove](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr.Strangelove)\ **Post date:** [December 24, 2021, 12:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-new-york-city-is-destroyed-what-will-the-headlines-say/956394/83 "2021-12-24T00:42:24Z")
> [@Riemann](#): > > If you’re going serious - a report about an object that size striking anywhere in North America is not coming from anywhere in North America. 1800 m is big but it’s not _that_ big. It would certainly destroy New York and much of the vicinity. The occupant of the White House would probably survive if they got shuffled quickly to a bunker. West of the Mississippi, there wouldn’t even be broken windows. The dust kicked up would disrupt farming for a long time, but that wouldn’t affect anyone in the short term. In terms of reporting, the biggest question is whether the 'net actually is resilient enough to cope with such an event. The west has plenty of undersea cables going to the rest of the world, but that would depend on the routing working well. ---
**Author:** ![Riemann](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/riemann/32/3133_2.png) [@Riemann](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Riemann)\ **Post date:** [December 24, 2021, 12:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-new-york-city-is-destroyed-what-will-the-headlines-say/956394/84 "2021-12-24T00:58:45Z")
> [@Dr.Strangelove](#): > > 1800 m is big but it’s not _that_ big. I was going by what we know about the Chicxulub asteroid, which was estimated to be 10km diameter. A 1.8km asteroid would have mass (and thus presumably energy) smaller than Chicxulub by a factor of about 200. According to the Wikipedia analysis of Chicxulub, that would still make a 1.8km asteroid equivalent to 500,000 Tsar Bombas, which sounds - significant. But I’m having a hard time getting a sense for what it means to divide the Chicxulub devastation by a factor of 200. [Chicxulub crater - Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chicxulub_crater) How are you estimating the effects? ---
**Author:** ![Dr.Strangelove](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dr.strangelove/32/6613_2.png) [@Dr.Strangelove](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr.Strangelove)\ **Post date:** [December 24, 2021, 1:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-new-york-city-is-destroyed-what-will-the-headlines-say/956394/85 "2021-12-24T01:07:29Z")
> [@Riemann](#): > > How are you estimating the effects? There are a few online simulators around: [https://asteroidcollision.herokuapp.com/](https://asteroidcollision.herokuapp.com/) [https://impact.ese.ic.ac.uk/ImpactEarth/cgi-bin/impact.cgi?latitude=&longitude=&LocationSelect=3&CraterSelect=0&diam=1800&diameterUnits=1&pdiameter\_select=0&pdens=&pdens\_select=3000&vel=&velocityUnits=1&velocity\_select=17&theta=&angle\_select=45&wdepth=&wdepthUnits=1&tdens=2750](https://impact.ese.ic.ac.uk/ImpactEarth/cgi-bin/impact.cgi?latitude=&longitude=&LocationSelect=3&CraterSelect=0&diam=1800&diameterUnits=1&pdiameter_select=0&pdens=&pdens_select=3000&vel=&velocityUnits=1&velocity_select=17&theta=&angle_select=45&wdepth=&wdepthUnits=1&tdens=2750) **Velocity** ’s article said 1840 m, so I went with that. The mass estimate is too small for an asteroid of that size, though. ---
**Author:** ![Riemann](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/riemann/32/3133_2.png) [@Riemann](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Riemann)\ **Post date:** [December 24, 2021, 1:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-new-york-city-is-destroyed-what-will-the-headlines-say/956394/86 "2021-12-24T01:29:45Z")
That’s very cool, thanks. ---
**Author:** ![Kent\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kent_clark/32/105_2.png) [@Kent\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kent_Clark)\ **Post date:** [December 24, 2021, 2:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-new-york-city-is-destroyed-what-will-the-headlines-say/956394/87 "2021-12-24T02:09:07Z")
**[Snopes.com](http://Snopes.com)** Is it true that all of New York City can be destroyed by a 1.8 km asteroid? ---
**Author:** ![txtumbleweed](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/278dde/32.png) [@txtumbleweed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/txtumbleweed)\ **Post date:** [December 24, 2021, 3:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-new-york-city-is-destroyed-what-will-the-headlines-say/956394/88 "2021-12-24T03:03:58Z")
> [@Senegoid](#): > > This is a perfect sort of question for Randall Munroe. > > Black hat guy: _“What if we fired more guns?”_ [In this what-if, Munroe discusses stopping a 12 ton locomotive moving at 100mph with a BB gun.](https://what-if.xkcd.com/18/) He ends up using 40000 people with AK-47s, which, by his calculations, would have what was left of the locomotive stopped and going backwards at close to Mach 1 in about 2 seconds. I would suspect that, to stop an asteroid, we may want to arm those folks with the 30mm cannons used on the A-10 Warthog for a bit more punch. [That, or hit it with a 500 terrawatt laser](https://what-if.xkcd.com/13/). Although that may be more dangerous to NYC (and the planet) than the actual asteroid. ---
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [December 24, 2021, 3:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-new-york-city-is-destroyed-what-will-the-headlines-say/956394/89 "2021-12-24T03:10:39Z")
Gizmodo: “We are SCREAMING about Billie Eilish’s New Boyfriend!” ---
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [December 24, 2021, 3:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-new-york-city-is-destroyed-what-will-the-headlines-say/956394/90 "2021-12-24T03:50:11Z")
io9: Robert Heinlein predicted this in 1941. ---
**Author:** ![panache45](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/panache45/32/64_2.png) [@panache45](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/panache45)\ **Post date:** [December 24, 2021, 10:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-new-york-city-is-destroyed-what-will-the-headlines-say/956394/91 "2021-12-24T10:20:40Z")
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