Near Miss

I hope this doesn't scare anyone. Life is a dangerous business.

In 2013 an asteroid weighing 120.000 tons will pass within 17,000 miles of the Earth -- beneath the orbits of our geosynchronous satellites. You will probably hear a loud Whooosh as it passes overhead.

But not to fear. Scientists have already devised methods of changing the orbital paths of such city-smashing monsters so they will stay away from Earth. They will simply paint one side of the asteroid white (or black, dependiing on the decorator's tastes) so that the light from the Sun will push the behemoth into a new orbit. If that doesn't work, they can shoot kinetic impactors at these space-boulders and bump them out of the way. And if that doesn't work there is always the nuclear solution. They will simply blast the boulder into gravel.