Near Earth Asteroid - pushing it aside

Anyone who has ever watched a Discovery Channel program about asteroids probably has a healthy respect for the damage one could do to our way of life if it struck Earth. So, if one is headed this way, what do we do? One theory is to intercept it with a nuclear bomb and blow it into smaller pieces. I suppose then we would be bombarded with a bunch of smaller, radioactive, asteroids.

Well, there's got to be a better way, and here's an intriguing theory from Space.com about an Asteroid Tugboat.

In the grand cosmic scheme of things, it's only a matter of time. Our planet is bound to tangle with an Earth-crossing asteroid, an event sure to make a mess. Some of these space rocks could demolish a city. Other monster boulders, the really big bruisers, could snuff out our civilization.

But why be at the mercy of a menacing asteroid that has Earth in its cross hairs? Now an expert team of astronauts and space scientists has blueprinted a safety strategy for Earth: an asteroid tugboat. The group says NASA is already working on the right recipe of technologies to make the tug a reality. It would be the greatest public safety project in history. Furthermore, they propose a mission to demonstrate the asteroid-tug concept by 2015.

I feel safer already.