On Friday, April 13, 2029, Earth Has a 99.7 Percent Chance of Being Missed by an Asteroid—Is That Good Enough?

A 25-million-ton 820-foot wide asteroid called 99942 Apophis will most likely whiz by the Earth at about 20,000 miles out on that day, according to an article on killer asteroids in the current issue of Popular Mechanics.  If this space mountain were to strike the planet it would hit with a force of 65,000 Hiroshima atomic bombs and could cause an 800 -foot tsunami. In other words, bad news for Mother Earth and for us.

So does humanity need a Planetary Protection Agency? And what about the Strong Gaia Hypothesis?