Scientists announce 'asteroid day' to spread global awareness about killer asteroids

Scientists recently announced "asteroid day," a global awareness campaign to educate the world about asteroids and released the 100x Declaration to protect the future of Earth from asteroid impacts and at a joint UK-US press conference.

The Declaration calls for three key actions; first, employ the available technology to detect and track near-Earth asteroids that threaten human populations; second, a rapid hundred-fold (100x) acceleration of the discovery and tracking of NEOS; third, global adoption of Asteroid Day on June 30, 2015, to heighten awareness of the asteroid hazard and our efforts to prevent future impacts.

The 100x Declaration was signed by more than 100 noted scientists, physicists, artists and business leaders from 30 countries, including Richard Dawkins, Brian Cox, Anousheh Ansari, Kip Thorne, Stewart Brand, investors Shervin Pishevar and Steve Jurvetson, Alan Eustace and Peter Norvig of Google, Peter Gabriel, Jane Luu, Helen Sharman, Jill Tarter and more than 38 astronauts and cosmonauts.

Astrophysicist Dr. Brian May, founding member and lead guitarist of the rock band Queen, joined Lord Martin Rees, the UK Royal Astronomer at the London Science Museum to host the press conference.

The event was linked to the California Academy of Sciences in San Francisco where Ryan Wyatt, Director of the Morrison Planetarium and Science Visualization, hosted Astronauts Tom Jones, Ed Lu, and Apollo 9 Astronaut Rusty Schweickart. Bill Nye, the Science Guy and CEO of the Planetary Society, joined via video from New York.

A central focus of the event was the release of a 100x Declaration, calling for the 100-fold increase in the detection and monitoring of asteroids. Lord Rees read the declaration, which resolves to "solve humanity's greatest challenges to safeguard our families and quality of life on Earth in the future.

The Founding Partners of Asteroid Day include The Planetary Society, Astronomy Magazine, Association of Space Explorers, California Academy of Sciences, Seattle's Museum of Flight, the Sentinel Mission, and Starmus.