"The risk of a cataclysmic asteroid impact might be small, but it could still happen..." via Unexplained-Mysteries Headline Image: Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech A planetary defense exercise at the weekend ended up 'destroying' an area of Europe around 100km wide. The risk of a cataclysmic asteroid impact might be small, but it could still happen - which is why every two years, scientists and emergency responders co-ordinate their efforts as part of a fictional threat exercise designed to see how civilization would cope if such a scenario were to actually take place. Part of the International Academy of Astronautics' Planetary Defense Conference, the simulation this year involved an asteroid that was a mere six months away from colliding with the Earth. Most of the methods devised to save us from a large asteroid impact involve detecting the space rock while it is still far out in space, thus providing enough time to do something about it. One possibility, for example, would be to fly