Russian Meteor Disaster: What If San Francisco Were Hit By 2012 DA14?

While some “experts” reminded us that the Earth is hit by asteroids once every 2,000 years, the fact is that our planet was both hit and closely visited by two cosmic objects within 24 hours. One of them, 2012 DA14, came to within 17,000 miles of the Earth’s surface. The other, a meteor that’s called “The Russian Meteor,” hit impact in Central Russia, Friday morning at 9:20 AM.

In my video presenting the various views of the impact of “The Russian Meteor,” Dr. Bill Nye, CEO of The Planetary Society, said that if 2012 DA14 hit Atlanta or Chicago, “that would be it,” for that city.

But what if that city was San Francisco?

The B612 Foundation, an organization tasked with the mission of hunting asteroids, asked just that question in January, and used the tourist attraction Meteor Crater as a model.

Meteor Crater is a well-preserved impact crater located in Arizona, and measures “nearly one mile across, 2.4 miles in circumference and more than 550 feet deep” – and is based on a meteor that’s about the same size at 2012 DA14.

So what if 2012 DA14 had hit San Francisco? This video gives us some idea…

Given what we’ve seen from the Russian Meteor, it’s fair to say that the San Francisco Bay Area would be visited by fragments from the cosmic object, and just where they may fall, or how many of them there would be, is a crap shoot. Given the lead time for 2012 DA14, all of the SF Bay Area would have to be evacuated.

San Francisco would be destroyed, but the resulting shock waves and tidal waves would wreck and drench Oakland, Berkeley, and much of the East Bay along the shores of the Bay itself.

Stay tuned.