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<br /><ul><li>Ufologolist Michael Horn claims that the '<keyword id="8002265" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="20" keywordseo="god-of-chaos">God of Chaos</keyword>' will strike Europe, the area between the North Sea and the Black Sea, when it visits Earth in 2029.</li><li>Horn believes the impact with crack the Earth open and let out massive gases, which would results in deaths within the immediate area.</li><li>NASA, on the other hand, claims that there is only a one in 45,000 chance that Apophis will be crash into the planet.</li></ul>The asteroid Aphophis — nicknamed the ‘God of Choas’ — will be zooming past the Earth in 2029.<br /><br />And if it crashes into planet instead, it will be somewhere over Europe, according to Michael Horn — a research scientist and representative for Billy Meier, a ufologist.<br /><br />Horn told the <a href="https://www.express.co.uk/news/weird/1187996/Asteroid-NASA-latest-warning-news-God-of-Chaos-Apophis-update-Earth-impact-99942">Express</a> that he has the impact area narrowed down to between the Black Sea, which is on the eastern end of Europe, and the North Sea, which is in the northwest bordering the UK, Denmark and Norway.<br /><br /><br />
  <div type="image" title="asteroidmap_edited" msid="71537133" hostid="261" caption="&amp;lt;p&amp;gt;Area between the North Sea and the Black Sea where Michael Horn believes the asteroid will strike&amp;lt;/p&amp;gt;"></div>



<br />He also dismisses NASA’s claim that the likelihood of a collision is one in 45,000. He insists it’s a certainty. <br /><br />The potential impact would be like 880 million tons of TNT exploding simultaneously. This would make it 65,000 times more destructive than the Hiroshima nuclear disaster.<br /><br /><strong>Earth will crack open<br /></strong><br />Horn believes that not only will the asteroid crash into the Earth, it will also crack it open. The split in the planet’s crust will release gases resulting in the death of millions in the immediate area, he told the <a href="https://www.express.co.uk/news/weird/1187996/Asteroid-NASA-latest-warning-news-God-of-Chaos-Apophis-update-Earth-impact-99942">Express.</a><br /><br />Elon Musk, the founder of SpaceX, doesn’t believe that an impact is likely but does believe that the <a href="https://www.businessinsider.in/elon-musk-says-we-have-no-defence-against-asteroid-god-of-chaos/articleshow/70748251.cms">Earth has no defence</a> in such an event.<br /><br /><br />"A big rock will hit Earth eventually and we currently have no defence," he said commenting on ‘God of Chaos’.<br /><br /><a href="https://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.php?feature=7390">NASA</a> feels that the asteroid’s trajectory will definitely be affected by its close encounter will Earth and might even cause avalanches on the space object’s surface.<br /><br />The planet is no stranger to asteroid fly-bys but Apophis isn’t like other asteroids. Discovered by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration in 2004, it’s bigger than most asteroids with a diameter of 340 meters.<br /><br />And, as it passes by, the ‘God of Chaos’ will be a little over 30,000 kilometers from the Earth’s surface — a distance at which many spacecraft’s orbit the planet.<br /><br /><strong>See also:<br /></strong><a href="https://www.businessinsider.in/elon-musk-says-we-have-no-defence-against-asteroid-god-of-chaos/articleshow/70748251.cms">Elon Musk says we have no defence against asteroid ‘God of Chaos'</a><br /><br /><br />

Ufologist claims the ‘God of Chaos’ asteroid will strike somewhere over Europe

<ul><li>Asteroid 2019 SR8 will be flying past Earth today.<br /></li><li>The asteroid will be travelling over ten times as fast as a rifle bullet.<br /></li><li>It is around half the size of the Statue of Liberty.<br /></li></ul>The National Aeronautics and Space Administration's (NASA) <a href="https://www.jpl.nasa.gov/asteroidwatch/">Asteroid Watch</a> is on the lookout for an asteroid that will be zooming past Earth. And, it is faster than a bullet.<br /><br />The speed of an average rifle bullet is 3,276 kilometers per hour (kmph) but Asteroid 2019 SR8 will be flying at more than ten times that speed — at 35,350 kmph.<br /><br /><strong>Size matters<br /></strong><br />On the one hand, Asteroid 2019 SR8 isn’t a very <a href="https://www.businessinsider.in/the-10-biggest-asteroids-that-could-crash-into-earth-this-year/articleshow/70686096.cms">big asteroid</a>. It measures between 20 meters to 44 meters in diameter — that’s half the height of the Statue of Liberty. On the other, its closest approach to Earth will only be 5 million kilometers from the planet. <br /><br />This may seem like a large distance but it’s enough for NASA to classify the incoming asteroid as a ‘close approach’ or a ‘near-Earth object’. It’s one of the many Apollo asteroids — an asteroid that orbits around the Sun and the Earth — to come visit.<br /><br /><strong>Final impact<br /></strong><br />Even though Asteroid 2019 SR8 will be under the close, watchful eye of NASA and the European Space Agency (ESA), the probability of an actual <a href="https://www.businessinsider.in/neil-degrasse-tyson-and-other-scientists-believe-asteroids-will-eventually-hit-earth/articleshow/70644547.cms">asteroid impact</a> is low.<br /><br />Should the <a href="https://www.businessinsider.in/asteroid-hitting-earth-and-ending-life-has-to-be-bigger-than-the-one-that-killed-dinosaurs/articleshow/70893317.cms">asteroid’s trajectory change</a>, its small size dictates that it will probably break up in Earth’s atmosphere.<br /><br />That isn’t to say an asteroid exploding mid-air won’t be harmful. It will still produce a large amount of energy equivalent to multiple nuclear explosions.<br /><br /><strong>See also:<br /></strong><a href="https://www.businessinsider.in/science/space/news/ufologist-claims-the-god-of-chaos-asteroid-will-strike-somewhere-over-europe/articleshow/71537022.cms">Ufologist claims the ‘God of Chaos’ asteroid will strike somewhere over Europe</a><br /><br /><a href="https://www.businessinsider.in/asteroid-gets-caught-changing-colours-for-the-very-first-time/articleshow/70942978.cms">Asteroid gets caught changing colours for the very first time</a><br /><br /><a href="https://www.businessinsider.in/the-10-biggest-asteroids-that-could-crash-into-earth-this-year/articleshow/70686096.cms">The 10 biggest asteroids that could crash into Earth in 2019</a><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br />

Asteroid flying faster than a bullet will shoot past Earth today

<ul class="summary-list"><li><keyword id="41531" type="COMPANY" weightage="60" keywordseo="space">Space</keyword> agencies around the world took part in a <keyword id="6360409" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="Nasa">NASA</keyword> <keyword id="67741" type="TECHNOLOGY" weightage="60" keywordseo="Simulation">simulation</keyword> of an asteroid-impact scenario.</li><li>The participating experts learned about a fictitious <keyword id="6549794" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="asteroid">asteroid</keyword>'s trajectory and had to react.</li><li>In the exercise, they couldn't stop it from hitting Europe, showing how <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/comet-neowise-surprise-appearance-earth-unprepared-for-asteroids-2020-7">unprepared we are for such a crisis</a>.</li></ul><p>Scientists around the world have been bamboozled this week by a fictitious asteroid heading toward Earth.</p><p>A group of experts from US and European space agencies attended a week-long exercise led by NASA in which they faced a hypothetical scenario: An asteroid 35 million miles away was approaching the planet and could hit within six months.</p><p>With each passing day of the exercise, the participants learned more about the asteroid's size, trajectory, and chance of impact. Then they had to cooperate and use their technological knowledge to see if anything could be done to stop the space rock.</p><p>The experts fell short. The group determined that none of Earth's existing technologies could stop the hypothetical asteroid from striking given the six-month timeframe of the simulation. In this alternate reality, the asteroid crashed into eastern Europe.</p><p>As far as we know, no asteroids currently pose a threat to Earth in this way. But an estimated two-thirds of asteroids 460 feet in size or bigger - large enough to wreak considerable havoc - <a href="https://www.nasa.gov/planetarydefense/faq/">remain undiscovered</a>. That's why NASA and other agencies are attempting to prepare for such a situation. </p><p>"These exercises ultimately help the planetary-defense community communicate with each other and with our governments to ensure we are all coordinated should a potential impact threat be identified in the future," Lindley Johnson, NASA's planetary defense officer, <a href="https://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/nasa-to-participate-in-tabletop-exercise-simulating-asteroid-impact">said in a press release</a>. </p><h2>6 months is not enough time to prepare for an asteroid impact</h2><p>The fictitious asteroid in the simulation was called 2021PDC. In NASA's scenario, it was first "spotted" on April 19, at which time it was thought to have a 5% of hitting our planet on October 20, six months after its discovery date. </p><p>But Day 2 of the exercise fast-forwarded to May 2, when new impact-trajectory calculations showed that 2021PDC would almost certainly hit either Europe or northern Africa. The participants in the simulation considered various missions in which spacecraft could try to destroy the asteroid or deflect it off its path.</p><div type="image" title="hypothetical impact" height="915" width="1120" msid="82344056" hostid="261"></div><p>But they concluded that such missions wouldn't be able to get off the ground in the short amount of time before the asteroid's impact.</p><p>"If confronted with the 2021PDC hypothetical scenario in real life, we would not be able us to launch any spacecraft on such short notice with current capabilities," <a href="https://cneos.jpl.nasa.gov/pd/cs/pdc21/pdc21_day2_briefing2.pdf">the participants said</a>. </p><p>They also considered trying to blow up or disrupt the asteroid using a nuclear explosive device.</p><p>"Deploying a nuclear disruption mission could significantly reduce the risk of impact damage," they found.</p><p>Still, the simulation stipulated that 2021PDC could be anywhere from 114 feet to half a mile in size, so the chance that a nuke could make a dent was uncertain. </p><p>Day 3 of the exercise skipped ahead to June 30, and Earth's future looked grim: 2021PDC's impact trajectory showed it headed for eastern Europe. By Day 4, which fast-forwarded to a week before the asteroid impact, there was a 99% chance the asteroid would hit near the border between Germany, the Czech Republic, and Austria. The explosion would bring as much energy as a large nuclear bomb.</p><p>All that could be done was evacuate the affected regions ahead of time.</p><h2>Most asteroids fly under the radar, and many are spotted too late</h2><div type="image" title="dinosaur asteroid meteor" height="1017" width="1440" msid="82344057" hostid="261"></div><p>It's tempting to assume that in the real world, astronomers would spot an asteroid akin to 2021PDC with much more notice than six months. But the world's ability to surveil near-Earth objects (NEOs) is woefully incomplete.</p><p>Any space rock with an orbit that takes it within 125 million miles of the sun is considered an NEO. But Johnson said in July that NASA thinks "we've only found about a third of the population of asteroids that are out there that could represent an impact hazard to the Earth."</p><p>Of course, humanity hopes to avoid a surprise like the dinosaurs got 65 million years ago, when a 6-mile-wide asteroid crashed into the Earth. But in recent years, scientists have missed plenty of large, dangerous objects that came close.</p><div type="image" title="comet neowise japan" height="1406" width="2500" msid="82344060" hostid="261"></div><p>Comet Neowise, a 3-mile-wide chunk of space ice, <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/comet-neowise-surprise-appearance-earth-unprepared-for-asteroids-2020-7">passed with 64 million miles of Earth</a> in July. Nobody knew that comet existed until a NASA space telescope discovered it approaching four months prior.</p><p>In 2013, a meteor about 65 feet in diameter entered the atmosphere traveling 40,000 mph. It exploded over Chelyabinsk, Russia, without warning, sending out a shock wave that broke windows and damaged buildings across the region. More than 1,400 people were injured.</p><div type="image" title="asteroid russia Chelyabinsk" height="3744" width="5616" msid="82344061" hostid="261"></div><p>And in 2019, a 427-foot-wide, "city-killer" asteroid <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/asteroid-flies-close-to-earth-surprising-scientists-2019-7">flew within 45,000 miles of Earth</a>. NASA had almost no warning about it.</p><p>That's because currently, the only way scientists can track an NEO is by pointing one of Earth's limited number of powerful telescopes in the right direction at the right time. </p><p>To address that problem, NASA announced two years ago that it would launch a new space telescope dedicated to watching for hazardous asteroids. That telescope, named the Near-Earth Object Surveillance Mission, along with the European Space Agency's newly launched <a href="https://www.esa.int/Safety_Security/Planetary_Defence/New_ESA_telescope_in_South_America_to_search_for_asteroids" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Test-Bed Telescope</a> and the <a href="https://www.esa.int/ESA_Multimedia/Images/2017/02/Flyeye_Observatory" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Flyeye Telescope</a> that's being built in Italy, should eventually bolster the number of NEOs we can track.</p><h2>NASA is testing ways to stymie an asteroid</h2><div type="image" title="DART nasa asteroid mission spacecraft" height="1406" width="2500" msid="82344065" hostid="261"></div><p>NASA has investigated the options scientists would have if they were to find a dangerous asteroid on a collision course with Earth. These include detonating an explosive device near the space rock, as the exercise participants suggested, or firing lasers that could heat up and vaporize the asteroid enough to change its path.</p><p>Another possibility is sending a spacecraft up to slam into an oncoming asteroid, thereby knocking it off its trajectory. This is the strategy NASA is most serious about: Later this year, the agency is scheduled to launch a test of such a technology. The Double Asteroid Redirection Test (<keyword id="348209" type="PERSON" weightage="60" keywordseo="Dart">DART</keyword>) will send a spacecraft to the asteroid Dimorphos and purposefully hit it in the fall of 2022.</p><p>NASA hopes that collision will change Dimorphos's orbit. While that asteroid isn't a threat to Earth, the mission could prove that redirecting an asteroid is possible with enough lead time.</p>

In a NASA simulation of an asteroid impact, scientists concluded they couldn't stop a space rock from decimating Europe

<ul class="summary-list"><li>NASA conducted a new tabletop simulation of <a target="_blank" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/potentially-hazardous-asteroids-fly-by-earth-this-week-watch-live-2024-6">discovering a large asteroid headed for Earth</a>.</li><li>Experts feared Congress wouldn't fund a mission to an asteroid with a 72% chance of impacting Earth.</li></ul><p>NASA recently brought together about 100 experts to <a target="_blank" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/nasa-simulated-asteroid-couldnt-stop-impact-europe-2021-5">pretend that an asteroid was heading for Earth</a>.</p><p>The tabletop <a target="_blank" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/nasa-asteroid-impact-simulations-difficult-to-stop-2021-5">simulation presented a hypothetical scenario</a> in which cities like Dallas, Washington, DC, and Madrid were at risk of a large asteroid impact.</p><p>"A <a target="_blank" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/adam-driver-asks-nasa-save-earth-from-world-ending-asteroids-2023-3">large asteroid impact</a> is potentially the only natural disaster humanity has the technology to predict years in advance and take action to prevent," Lindley Johnson, a NASA planetary defense officer emeritus, said in a press release.</p><p>But it wasn't clear that they could prevent such a catastrophe — even with 14 years to figure it out.</p><p>The simulation revealed that <a target="_blank" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/moon-missions-why-astronauts-have-not-returned-2018-7">technology wasn't the problem</a> that could ultimately doom a city, region, or entire country. It was politics.</p><div type="image" title="Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer at the Capitol on December 12, 2023." height="1500" width="2000" msid="111347083" hostid="261"></div><p>"I know what I would prefer [to do], but Congress will tell us to wait," one participant said of their asteroid-response plan, in a selection of anonymized comments in NASA's summary of the exercise, published on June 20.</p><p>"The most important item of the morning was the discussion involving the political nature of the decision-making," another participant said.</p><h2 id="fff0e374-634e-421c-bed3-007449857a08">Congress may not move fast enough</h2><p>NASA has conducted nearly a dozen tabletop simulations since 2013. This one happened in May and included participants from the US State Department, FEMA, and the space agencies of Europe, the UK, Japan, and Canada.</p><div type="image" title="large conference room with long desks full of people in suits sitting at laptops and looking at a large presentation screen with a person at a podium presenting" height="900" width="1634" msid="111347084" hostid="261"></div><p>Past exercises showed that, in order to save the world, NASA would need at least <a target="_blank" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/nasa-asteroid-simulation-reveals-need-years-of-warning-2021-5">five years' notice that an asteroid was headed toward us</a>, maybe even 10 years.</p><p>This time the simulators learned that, even when they had plenty of time, they might not be able to launch their preferred anti-asteroid offensive.</p><p>That's because they didn't think Congress would approve funding for a critical space mission to study the asteroid "unless impact became certain," NASA's summary said.</p><p>A major part of the simulation was figuring out how to impress the "seriousness" of the situation upon Congress and other leadership, Johnson said.</p><p>What's more, the 14-year timeline spanned multiple budget cycles and presidential elections. At any of those junctures, the president, Congress, or NASA's own leadership could change priorities and disrupt the asteroid plan.</p><h2 id="16c29872-b78b-4870-bb8a-e51b843db37f">The most likely incoming asteroid scenario</h2><p id="16c29872-b78b-4870-bb8a-e51b843db37f">Here are the hypothetical conditions the participants were given in this year's exercise: Scientists have determined a 72% chance of this asteroid impacting Earth in 14 years. It could strike anywhere across a swath of North America, Europe, Africa, and the Middle East.</p><p id="16c29872-b78b-4870-bb8a-e51b843db37f">The asteroid's size was unclear. It could be anywhere from 60 to 800 meters (half a mile) wide — possibly big enough to devastate an entire country.</p><p id="16c29872-b78b-4870-bb8a-e51b843db37f">All that uncertainty made this "a very realistic scenario," Richard Binzel, a planetary scientist at MIT who specializes in potentially hazardous asteroids, but did not participate in the simulation, told Business Insider.</p><p id="16c29872-b78b-4870-bb8a-e51b843db37f">"In fact, it's the most likely type of scenario we will face, where an asteroid is discovered and we have limited information," Binzel said.</p><p id="16c29872-b78b-4870-bb8a-e51b843db37f">Options for preventing an asteroid impact include shooting the asteroid with lasers, launching a nuclear bomb at it, or simply smacking a space probe into it to nudge it away from Earth.</p><p>NASA has tested one of those options in a <a target="_blank" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/nasa-crashes-dart-spacecraft-into-asteroid-to-test-planetary-defense-2022-9">mission that punched an asteroid</a> and dramatically changed its path in 2022, just to prove the technique could work.</p><div type="image" title="sequence of images showing asteroid from a distance then close up then video cutting out" height="1000" width="2000" msid="111347087" hostid="261"></div><p id="16c29872-b78b-4870-bb8a-e51b843db37f">In the simulation, experts wanted more information to understand their anti-asteroid options.</p><p id="16c29872-b78b-4870-bb8a-e51b843db37f">Unfortunately, the fictional space rock was about to <a target="_blank" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/comet-neowise-surprise-appearance-earth-unprepared-for-asteroids-2020-7">pass behind the sun and disappear</a> from view for seven months. To avoid wasting precious time, scientists would have to send a spacecraft to the asteroid to learn more about it.</p><p>That's where they feared politics would get in the way. Participants weren't sure Congress would fund the mission unless the asteroid was a certain threat — not a 72% chance of threat.</p><p>So far, NASA has not discovered any large asteroids on track to impact Earth.</p><p>But scientists have identified fewer than 11,000 near-Earth asteroids that are at least 140 meters (460 feet) wide — big enough to crush a city. They believe there are 15,000 of them in our vicinity, meaning more than a quarter of city killers remain undiscovered.</p><h2 id="8dbc0625-4426-4bc0-ba2d-99b4f3dc63a5">NASA could plan a mission just in case</h2><p>Binzel says NASA could get political and bureaucratic barriers out of the way now, before any asteroid threats are identified, by developing a reconnaissance mission to have on standby.</p><p>"It's an adult thing to do that can protect us from becoming surprised," he said.</p><p>The National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine made a similar recommendation in its last decadal survey of planetary science priorities.</p><p>In that 2022 <a target="_blank" href="https://nap.nationalacademies.org/resource/26522/interactive/">report</a>, the Academies said that NASA should "develop an approach for a rapid-response, flyby" spacecraft to closely study newly-discovered threats. That way, it could launch a reconnaissance mission in less than three years if it became necessary. The Academies also recommended a demonstration to practice reconnaissance on a real asteroid.</p><p>So why isn't NASA working on that right now?</p><p>"It's not in the budget," Binzel said.</p><p>First NASA has to make a proposal for such a mission, with a thumbs up from the White House, and then Congress would have to authorize and fund it.</p><p>"If there's an asteroid out there with our name on it, it's already there," Binzel said. "Fortunately, the chance in the next century or so is incredibly small. But it's not zero."</p>

NASA simulated an incoming asteroid impact, and the biggest roadblock to action was penny pinching

<h2></h2><ul class="summary-list"><li>In a recent <keyword id="67741" type="TECHNOLOGY" weightage="60" keywordseo="Simulation">simulation</keyword>, <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/nasa-simulated-asteroid-couldnt-stop-impact-europe-2021-5">a fictitious asteroid was approaching Earth</a> but experts couldn't stop it.</li><li><keyword id="6360409" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="Nasa">NASA</keyword> has led seven such simulations, and the participants only fully stopped the asteroid once.</li><li>It shows <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/nasa-asteroid-simulation-reveals-need-years-of-warning-2021-5">how challenging it would be</a> to stop an Earth-bound <keyword id="41531" type="COMPANY" weightage="60" keywordseo="space">space</keyword> rock, even with ample warning.</li></ul><p>An international group of space experts have been bested by a hypothetical asteroid. Again.</p><p><a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/nasa-simulated-asteroid-couldnt-stop-impact-europe-2021-5">In a planetary-defense simulation that NASA led last month</a>, more than 200 participants from about two dozen countries learned that a fictitious space rock was set to strike Earth in six months. They put their heads together to investigate every possible way to avoid the impact. But in the end, the group determined that no existing technologies could stop the asteroid, <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/nasa-asteroid-simulation-reveals-need-years-of-warning-2021-5">given the limited warning time in the scenario</a>. The rock ended up razing eastern Europe.</p><p>Paul Chodas, manager of NASA's Center for Near-Earth Object Studies, helped design and host the recent simulation, as well as five previous exercises like it that the agency has hosted since 2013. In total NASA has helped lead seven asteroid-impact scenarios in the last eight years.</p><p>"Every one of these has a little different bit of a twist on it," Chodas told Insider.</p><p>But the outcomes have, for the most part, had a worrisome similarity: In all but one, at least part of the incoming space rock has hit Earth.</p><p>"There is a certain, you know, morbid aspect to it," Matthew Holman, an astronomer from Harvard University who participated in NASA's 2015 and 2019 simulations, told Insider.</p><p>The simulations' grim outcomes reveal how challenging it would be to stop an Earth-bound asteroid in real life - even with years of warning. But the repeated failures in these exercises, experts say, still serve a crucial purpose: They help the world prepare for a crisis like this by teaching governments and scientists how to communicate and share information ahead of an impact. </p><p>"Practice makes perfect," Chodas said.</p><h2>The score - <keyword id="81841" type="PERSON" weightage="60" keywordseo="Asteroids">Asteroids</keyword>: 6 Humanity: 1</h2><p>Chodas said last month's simulation set the participants up for failure.</p><p>"It's what we call a short-warning scenario," he said. "It was, by design, very challenging."</p><p>But it wasn't the toughest scenario Chodas has helped to create, and not even the one with the shortest timeframe.</p><p>During NASA's first impact simulation, done in partnership with the Federal Emergency Management Agency, scientists and government officials had to determine what to do about an asteroid the size of the Statue of Liberty that was set to strike in just <a href="https://cneos.jpl.nasa.gov/pd/cs/ttx13/NASA.FEMA.Exercise.Report.2013.pdf">five weeks</a>. The participants, much like the group last month, found themselves with little recourse given the short lead-up time. They determined it would be impossible to stop that space rock from crashing into the Atlantic Ocean near Virginia.</p><p>The resulting tsunami, the participants estimated, would be 50 feet high and devastate a section of the US East Coast.</p><p>It was no coincidence that NASA led that first simulation in 2013. In February of that year, a house-sized asteroid entered the atmosphere above Chelyabinsk, Russia. It shattered windows, collapsed buildings, and injured more than 1,000 people. No one on Earth saw it coming. </p><div type="image" title="asteroid russia Chelyabinsk" height="3744" width="5616" msid="82800921" hostid="261"></div><p><a href="https://cneos.jpl.nasa.gov/pd/cs/ttx14/">The next year</a>, NASA and FEMA tried again - that time, the fictitious asteroid in the simulation was nearly three times bigger, but it was discovered about seven years before the expected impact.</p><p>The earlier a space rock is discovered, the higher the chances that scientists can stymie an impact. The best tools currently available are nuclear explosives that could be detonated near an asteroid to break it into less dangerous chunks, and spacecraft that could slam into an asteroid to knock it off its trajectory.</p><p>NASA is about to test that latter technology with its Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART) mission. In the fall of 2022, a NASA probe is set to fly to the asteroid Dimorphos and purposefully hit it.</p><div type="image" title="DART nasa asteroid mission spacecraft" height="1406" width="2500" msid="82800926" hostid="261"></div><p>Chodas thinks <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/nasa-asteroid-simulation-reveals-need-years-of-warning-2021-5">five years' warning</a> is the absolute minimum to successfully deploy one of these options, though other experts suggest we'd need <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/nasa-asteroid-simulation-reveals-need-years-of-warning-2021-5">at least a decade</a> to plan, build, and launch an anti-asteroid mission from scratch.</p><p>Brent Barbee, an aerospace engineer at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, told Insider that no spacecraft that could serve this purpose is just sitting "ready to go and dance."</p><p>"It has to be built on demand," Barbee said.</p><p>The advanced notice in NASA's 2014 simulation enabled the participants to do just that. They sent a spacecraft to ram into the asteroid and deflect it away two years before it hit. </p><p>But even then, a 164-foot chunk of the asteroid broke off because of the spacecraft's force, and the rock started heading for Texas' Gulf Coast. Two years wasn't enough time to launch another deflection mission, so once again, Earth took a hit.</p><h2>In one simulation, an asteroid fragment wrecked New York City</h2><p>By <a href="https://cneos.jpl.nasa.gov/pd/cs/pdc15/">2015</a>, NASA had looped in space agencies from several other countries to participate in its exercises. The first simulation with this international group was similar to the prior year's: After successfully deflecting an asteroid spotted seven years in advance, the participants found they couldn't stop a fragment of the rock from hitting India. It exploded with the force of a small bomb.</p><div type="image" title="asteroid broken up" height="2250" width="3000" msid="82800930" hostid="261"></div><p>Chodas calls this outcome "asteroid splitting." It's no accident splitting has appeared in multiple exercises, he said, because he thinks "it's very conceivable something like that happens."</p><p>Ideally, Chodas added, asteroid-deflection missions would be adaptable and able to retarget any unpredictable pieces that break off. </p><p>By now, you're seeing the pattern: In a <a href="https://cneos.jpl.nasa.gov/pd/cs/ttx16/ttx3_final_report_1may2017_final_3.pdf">2016 NASA simulation</a>, the group was also unable to stop an asteroid, even though it was spotted four years in advance. The 400-foot space rock would, the participants estimated, impact a 325-square-mile area near Pasadena, California.</p><p>During the <a href="https://cneos.jpl.nasa.gov/pd/cs/pdc19/">2019 exercise</a>, experts decided to try to stop a hypothetical asteroid from hitting Denver, Colorado, by crashing into it with several spacecraft. That wound up changing the asteroid's path, but in the process, a 262-foot chunk of rock broke off and struck New York City.</p><p>Chodas described that exercise as "a worst-case scenario" - it ended with Central Park decimated by a fireball that released as much energy as an atomic bomb.</p><div type="image" title="central park tower nyc" height="1667" width="2500" msid="82800935" hostid="261"></div><p>In last month's simulation, the Czech Republic and Austria didn't fare much better.</p><p>Humanity's big - and only - win in these exercises came during the <a style="font-size: 15px;" href="https://cneos.jpl.nasa.gov/pd/cs/pdc17/">2017</a> one, in which the participants spotted an Eiffel Tower-sized asteroid 10 years in advance. After sending a scouting mission into space, scientists discovered that it was actually two space rocks orbiting each other. This is known as a binary asteroid. NASA gave the simulation that curveball, Chodas said, because one-third of asteroids tend to be binary. </p><p>Rather than ramming a spacecraft into that asteroid pair, the experts chose to blow them up with nukes - and succeeded. </p><h2>Despite repeated failures, experts are learning valuable lessons</h2><div type="image" title="hypothetical impact" height="915" width="1120" msid="82800936" hostid="261"></div><p>Since 2013, these simulations have enabled experts to practice how they'd communicate with one another and with the public ahead of an impact. They think through how they'd facilitate evacuations, what they'd say to keep the public calm and informed, and how to responsibly share information between governments. </p><p>Holman said that each successive NASA exercise has improved on its predecessor.</p><p>"People have absolutely gotten better over the years," he said, adding that more and more countries participate every time. </p><p>In particular, scientists have refined their ability to use a hypothetical asteroid's size, rotation, and orbital path to predict where it will hit and how much damage it will do. Those assessments can help governments decide how to best reduce the severity of an impact and move the right people out of harm's way.</p><p>The simulations have also revealed that such assessments change quickly as scientists learn about an incoming asteroid. During the earliest stages of an exercise, the possible impact location could be anywhere on the globe, Barbee said. That estimate shifts as the simulation progresses, so data might then suggest an asteroid will crash into Africa, only to point to Europe as the most likely target soon thereafter.</p><p>"I'm glad we're discovering those sorts of things now by working through the details of simulated scenarios before being confronted with an actual scenario," Barbee said.</p><p><em>Morgan McFall-Johnsen contributed reporting.</em></p>

NASA has led 7 asteroid-impact simulations. Only once did experts figure out how to stop the space rock from hitting Earth.

<p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span>Getty</span></p><p class="caption">Theresa May revealed the latest set of warnings about a no-deal Brexit.</p></div><p></p></div></div></p><ul class="summary-list"><li><strong>The latest tranche of no-deal Brexit papers have been released by the <keyword id="6354868" type="COUNTRY" weightage="60" keywordseo="UK">UK</keyword> government.</strong></li><li><strong>They reveal that mobile phone calls in Europe could become more expensive.</strong></li><li><strong>International driving permits would be required to drive to Europe.</strong></li><li><strong>Britain would fall out of space surveillance programmes.</strong></li></ul><p>LONDON - The UK government on Thursday released the latest set of papers today warning UK citizens about what to expect if the government fails to negotiate a Brexit deal with the EU.</p><p>They cover everything from trade, to broadcast rules, to driving licences and add to previous releases which suggest a no-deal Brexit could also hit pensions, credit card payments and food imports.</p><p>Here's everything you need to know about what more to expect if Britain crashes out of the EU without a deal.</p><h2>Using your phone in Europe could become more expensive</h2><p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span>Shutterstock</span></p></div><p></p></div></div>Any UK citizen visiting Europe currently benefits from an EU directive which bars roaming charges on mobile phones. This means you're not hit with a big bill while you're away, just for making a few calls, sending a few texts or checking your social media accounts. </p><p>However, if Britain crashes out without a deal then that could all come to an end.</p><p>"In the unlikely event that we leave the EU without a deal, the costs that EU mobile operators would be able to charge UK operators for providing roaming services would no longer be regulated after March 2019," today's papers state.</p><p>"This would mean that surcharge-free roaming when you travel to the EU could no longer be guaranteed."</p><p>Ministers insist that they would cap any new charges and mobile operators also insist they have no current plans to reimpose them. However, leaving the EU without a deal means this cannot be absolutely guaranteed for UK citizens.</p><h2>Driving to the continent would become more difficult</h2><p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span>Getty</span></p></div><p></p></div></div>If Britain leaves without a deal then UK driving licenses will no longer be accepted means to drive within EU countries. The government warns that in a no-deal scenario UK drivers would instead have to apply for an International Driving Permit (IDP) in the same way they do already to travel in many non-EU countries. Failure to do so would mean you could be in breach of EU law, with any travel insurance potentially invalidated too.</p><h2>Medicines would become more expensive</h2><p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span>perfectlab/Shutterstock</span></p></div><p></p></div></div>A no-deal Brexit scenario would mean Britain falling out of EU agreements on the import and export of medicines. This would mean that the UK would have to apply for individual licenses (costing around £24 a go) to import drugs. This would hit both consumers and the NHS hard and lead to potential shortages of key medicines. </p><h2>Gun smuggling could become easier</h2><p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span><a href="http://www.apimages.com/Search?query=guns+show&amp;ss=10&amp;st=kw&amp;entitysearch=&amp;toItem=18&amp;orderBy=Newest&amp;searchMediaType=allmedia">Elaine Thompson/AP</a></span></p><p class="caption">About 2 million guns were reported stolen in the last decade.</p></div><p></p></div></div>If Britain leaves without a deal then European Firearm Permits (EFPs) will no longer be recognised by the UK. Critics suggest this means there would need to be extra physical checks at the Irish border. </p><p>"This looks dangerous. The government hasn't figured out how to sort out the Irish border, but now we're being told that we'll no longer be able to keep tabs on which EU citizens with guns," Liberal Democrat MP and Best for Britain campaigner Layla Moran said in a statement.</p><p>"The Irish border will become the doorway to people wanting to bring guns into the country. This is no joke. We need a people's vote with the option to stay in the EU and stop this madness."</p><p>However, today's government papers insis this would not weaken gun controls as "<span>the police would continue to assess an applicant's fitness to hold a firearm as part of their consideration of the Visitor's Permit application."</span></p><h2>The UK could be the last to hear about an asteroid strike</h2><p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span><a href="https://www.jpl.nasa.gov/spaceimages/details.php?id=PIA18922">NASA/JPL-Caltech</a></span></p></div><p></p></div></div>Leaving the EU without a deal means that Britain would fall out of the UK space surveillance programme. This means that it would no longer receive "space, surveillance and tracking data" from the EU and would be entirely reliant on info from the US.</p>    <p class="tagline">Our Brexit Insider Facebook group is the best place for up-to-date news and analysis about Britain's departure from the EU, direct from Business Insider's political reporters. Join <a href="https://www.facebook.com/groups/267178180471848/">here.</a></p>    <div class="margin-top">        <h3>NOW WATCH: <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/yifang-mudflip-taiwan-bubble-tea-brand-opens-in-london-2018-8">This Taiwanese tea is so popular in London that it's only sold twice a day and is limited to 1 per person</a></h3>        <div>                    </div>    </div>

Five ways life could become harder for British people if there is a no-deal Brexit

<p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table click-to-enlarge"><div><div class="image on-image"><a title_source="REUTERS/Joshua Roberts" title_caption="A trader told us: " The="" less="" liquidity="" you="" have="" the="" it="" takes="" to="" push="" market="" around="" You="" literally="" need="" know="" nothing="" other="" than="" what="" a="" correctly="" uttered="" phrase="" would="" do="" market.="" class="zoomin" href="https://static-ssl.businessinsider.com/image/5b5721ff88be232e008b45e5-960/nigel farage.jpg"><span class="sprites click-to-enlarge-icon" title="Click to enlarge"></span></a><p class="source"><span>REUTERS/Joshua Roberts</span></p><p class="caption">A trader told us: "The less liquidity you have the less it takes to push the market around ... You literally need to know nothing other than what a correctly uttered phrase would do to the market."</p></div><p></p></div></div></p><ul><li><strong>Nigel Farage made predictions on the night of the Brexit vote that turned out to be wrong, even though he knew of two private polls that predicted the correct outcome.</strong></li><li><strong>Sources in the FX trading world told Business Insider of a speculative theory that someone placed a massive "knock-in short" against the pound.</strong></li><li><strong> Such a bet would require the pound to move up on June 23 before it fell, which is exactly what the pound did after Farage spoke.</strong></li><li><strong>FX traders say pricing data on the night shows the "knock-in short" theory is plausible.</strong></li><li><strong>Farage told Business Insider that this is "a crackpot lunatic conspiracy theory."</strong></li></ul><p><br />LONDON - As the EU Referendum approached in 2016, foreign currency traders knew they were looking at a "multi big fig" day. The beauty of June 23 from a trader's perspective was that whichever way the vote went, it would move the pound against the dollar dramatically - "multiple big figures" - and not the mere decimal places that characterize most currency movements. If Britain voted to remain in the EU, the pound would bounce sharply up against the dollar. If the UK voted to leave Europe, the pound was expected to fall quickly.</p><p>The Brexit vote was going to be close. Polls suggested a 52% vs 48% victory for Remain, but that was near the margin of error. Major polling organisations had declined to conduct exit polls on the day because the vote was so unusual they had no comparative data to ensure their accuracy. The result was going to be tight and uncertain.</p><p>Leave won and the pound went into freefall on the night. The EU Referendum was the most dramatic day in sterling trade since "Black Wednesday" in 1992, when <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Wednesday">George Soros placed a short bet against the pound and forced the Bank of England to abandon the European Exchange Rate Mechanism</a>.</p><p>For FX traders, that type of big, sudden movement is a golden opportunity. You can make a lot of money if you know which direction the pound is going before it moves.</p><p>Unsurprisingly, traders have gossiped since that day about who made money and who lost. The gossip was fueled recently by <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2018-06-25/brexit-big-short-how-pollsters-helped-hedge-funds-beat-the-crash">a Bloomberg report that said several hedge funds bought in-depth private polls showing that Leave was the likely winner</a> even though less-robust polls for the media were tipping Remain.</p><p>The report also says that Nigel Farage, the leader of the United Kingdom Independence Party, made predictions on the night of the vote that turned out to be wrong, even though he had been supplied with information from two private polls that predicted the correct outcome.</p><p>A source who has been in the FX trading world for years told Business Insider that his favourite speculative theory about Farage's statements was that someone used them to place a massive "knock-in short" option strategy on the pound. Such a bet would require the pound hit a specific price before falling - something that a lack of liquidity in the market indicated was unlikely to happen on the night.</p><p>And yet the pound did exactly that.</p><p>If the theory is true, they made a lot of money.</p><h2>"A crackpot lunatic conspiracy theory"</h2><p>We can't say what exactly happened. Farage denied to Business Insider that he knew anything about short action on the pound on June 23, 2016. And there is no suggestion that Farage has engaged in any wrongdoing. But FX traders in The City are gossiping. Below is our explanation of the Brexit "knock-in short" theory, as told to us by one trader.</p><p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table click-to-enlarge"><div><div class="image on-image"><a title_source="PoundSterlingLive.com" title_caption="" class="zoomin" href="https://static-ssl.businessinsider.com/image/5b571fc43b49fc35008b4635-960/gbp vs usd on june 23 2016 brexit short farage.png"><span class="sprites click-to-enlarge-icon" title="Click to enlarge"></span></a><p class="source"><span><a href="https://www.poundsterlinglive.com/eur/5082-pound-to-euro-exchange-rate-3434">PoundSterlingLive.com</a></span></p></div><p></p></div></div></p><p>Farage told Business Insider that the theory is "a crackpot lunatic conspiracy theory." He points out that most polling companies, including YouGov - which had embedded itself in a hedge fund's office on the evening of the vote - got their pro-Remain predictions wrong, just like he did. He believed their data, he says.</p><p>Ken Veksler, the director of Accumen Management, who has traded currency for 22 years, told Business Insider that he thinks the "knock-in short" theory is plausible: "Is it possible? Most certainly yes. Is it probable? In the absence of knowing for certain, I'm inclined to say ... maybe?!"</p><p>Another trader, FX strategist Viraj Patel of ING, told Business Insider that "you can make the position that there was a knock-in short." Of course, like everyone else, he says it cannot be proven either way.</p><p>And Jordan Rochester, G10 FX strategist at Nomura, said via email, "Knock-in shorts could definitely have been triggered, (i.e. a put spread with a knock in at a higher strike than current spot that expires worthless if not triggered = makes it very cheap but potentially very valuable given what happened on Brexit). But I have to say it would have been a heroic assumption in advance to have bought a GBPUSD put with a knock-in at 1.50." It would have been easier to simply short the pound on the day, he said, and thus the theory seems improbable.</p><p>Regardless, this is what traders have been talking about in the month since the Bloomberg story was published.</p><h2>"I think Remain will edge it"</h2><p>The controversy exists because one of the private hedge-fund polls was done by Survation, a polling company so close to Farage's UKIP that <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2018-06-25/brexit-big-short-how-pollsters-helped-hedge-funds-beat-the-crash">the two organisations once shared an office,</a> according to Bloomberg.</p><p>As the referendum voting came to an end, Farage was told that Survation was predicting a Remain victory, Farage confirmed to Business Insider. Separately, <a href="https://www.ft.com/content/dae3d7c8-7bb8-11e8-8e67-1e1a0846c475">UKIP-funder Arron Banks had also commissioned a private poll</a>, according to the Financial Times. And both polls were showing that Leave had won.</p><p>On that basis, the pound should have been going down.</p><p>Yet Farage gave two statements to the media that night, saying "I think Remain will edge it."</p><p>Unsurprisingly, once the statements were aired by Sky News and the Press Association after the polls closed at 10 p.m., the pound moved up against the dollar, from around $1.48 where it had been at 8 p.m. to over $1.50 - a significant move for a major currency. Investors, believing Britain would stay inside the EU, were showing their confidence in the British economy by buying up the pound against the dollar.</p><p>They were heading the wrong way.</p><p>Farage told Business Insider that he had given his statements to the press at 8 p.m. that evening, and they were only aired by the media at 10 p.m., after the polls closed. He disregarded the Survation and Banks data because "I didn't believe it. I did not believe Banks was right," he told us. All the other polls showed a Remain win. Farage says he did not become convinced that Leave had won until after several constituencies reported their actual votes, by 2 or 2.30 a.m. that night.</p><p>Significantly, anyone who knew between 8 p.m. and 10 p.m. that Farage was going to say that Remain won <em>even though his polling data said the opposite</em> might have some actionable trading data. Two hours is an eternity in the FX markets.</p><h2>If the Banks and Survation data were reliable, then the pound was likely to fall. So why did it continue to go up?</h2><p>The "knock-in" option theory argues that if the Banks and Survation data were reliable, and Leave was the likely winner, then the pound was likely to fall. So why did it continue to go up?</p><p>The answer is, in part, Farage's statement. Sky News broadcast a statement from him shortly before 10 p.m. that "It looks like Remain will edge it." <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/videos/2018-06-25/sky-news-broadcast-of-farage-concession-statement-and-yougov-poll-video">You can see Farage's "concession" statement on Sky News here</a>, timestamped at 10 p.m. London/11 p.m. Gibraltar, the first constituency to report a result.</p><p>Shortly after that, the Press Association published a statement from Farage that said, "I think Remain will edge it, yes." At least one of those statements was made <em>after</em> Farage had been told by Survation and Banks' pollsters that Leave appeared to have won, Bloomberg reported. (<a href="https://www.ft.com/content/dae3d7c8-7bb8-11e8-8e67-1e1a0846c475">Survation denied supplying the information to Farage</a> when asked about it by the Financial Times.)</p><p>However, Farage told Business Insider this week that he <em>did</em> know about both polls, but he thought they were both likely wrong. And Farage's PR rep, Gawain Towler, wrote a column for The Telegraph in which he said <a href="https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2018/06/26/nigel-farage-referendum-night-no-brexit-short-conspiracy/">he knew that Survation had polling data with more depth than the others before the voting was over</a>.</p><p>"I knew someone had commissioned Damian Lyons-Lowe and his firm Survation. I also knew that the poll was a big one, far bigger than either Ukip or Leave.EU had previously commissioned, but of course the details of the poll could not be released, as public polling while votes are being cast is illegal," Towler wrote.</p><p>At the time the polls closed, the pound had settled at $1.48 while everyone waited for the actual results. There was little liquidity in the spot market, our source says, meaning that traders had locked in their derivative trades, hedged their positions, and no one was trading while they waited for the results to hit the market. "Liquidity was dire," the source says. ING's Patel added that "The only market open was the US. There was really thin liquidity."</p><h2>The lack of liquidity was matched by a lack of exit poll data</h2><p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span><a href="https://www.poundsterlinglive.com/eur/5082-pound-to-euro-exchange-rate-3434">PoundSterlingLive</a></span></p><p class="caption">Chart based on PoundSterlingLive's coverage of price action on the night of the vote.</p></div><p></p></div></div></p><p>Historically, official exit polls - announced by the media when voting stops at 10 p.m. - have moved the currency markets. "Anyone would be aware that the exit poll itself would drive the currency markets," ING's Patel told Business Insider.</p><p>But in 2016, the BBC, ITV and Sky News chose not to commission an exit poll because referendums are so rare in Britain they had no comparable historic data to ensure the results were reliable. "Polls mattered materially" during the Brexit campaign, Patel said. "Especially on the day itself and the days before. Even comments from politicians were driving the pound."</p><p>Into that vacuum fell Farage's "concession." Sky led its post-10 p.m. results coverage with Farage's statement, not a prediction of the results. The statement functioned as a concrete piece of public data from a leading politician that indicated a result. In effect, it carried the equivalent weight of an exit poll.</p><p>And only <em>after</em> Farage's "concession" did the pound go above $1.50.</p><p>In a "knock-in short," an investor makes a short bet but the position isn't "knocked-in" until the pound hits a certain price. Within minutes of Farage's statement being broadcast, the pound moved upward from $1.48.80. Buyers in the spot market plunged into the pound, driving up the price.</p><p>As it neared $1.50, the price declined a bit. That is noteworthy because it is a possible sign of sellers "defending" their position in the hopes of keeping it under $1.50. In a "knock-in" short, the counterparty risks losing money if the price target is triggered. So counterparty investors had an incentive to sell pounds in hopes of keeping it below the $1.50 trigger, the theory says. The pound's brief decline <em>after</em> it rose from $1.48 but <em>before</em> it hit $1.50 therefore looks like circumstantial evidence that someone was trying to prevent the pound from reaching $1.50.</p><p>But the pound broke upward again, cresting at nearly $150.02.</p><p>With the knock-in triggered, the sellers ended their defence and the pound went into an immediate freefall down to $1.30 in early August &amp;mdash a historically swift and brutal collapse. (<a href="https://www.poundsterlinglive.com/eur/5082-pound-to-euro-exchange-rate-3434">There is a detailed account of the pound's progress on the night at PoundSterlingLive.com</a>.)</p><h2>"You have to have balls the size of asteroids to put it on"</h2><p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table click-to-enlarge"><div><div class="image on-image"><a title_source="Twitter" title_caption="Leave supporters believed the pound would accurately signal whether the vote had been won or lost." class="zoomin" href="https://static-ssl.businessinsider.com/image/5b572886c171cb3f008b45f6-960/leaveeu party cheer falling pound brexit.png"><span class="sprites click-to-enlarge-icon" title="Click to enlarge"></span></a><p class="source"><span>Twitter</span></p><p class="caption">Leave supporters believed the pound would accurately signal whether the vote had been won or lost.</p></div><p></p></div></div></p><p>In this case, our source speculates that the knock-in trigger was $1.50 and the short position was initiated at $1.55, meaning the investor would gain the difference between $1.55 and anything below that, minus the cost of the trade when the trade was closed out. Crucially, the bet wouldn't pay off if the pound fell from $1.48. It had to go above $1.50 first. In percentage terms, the pound's decline was 13% into August. But FX trades are leveraged or done on margin, so anyone who held a short position earned many multiples of that. Our source believes the cumulative value of the trade was probably somewhere like $500 million.</p><p>"You have to have balls the size of asteroids to put it on," our source says.</p><p>Our source admits there is no evidence that Farage's statements were coordinated with a knock-in trade. The reason people are still talking about it is that "it looks too clean to be coincidental," he says. Another aspect fuelling the gossip was the lack of liquidity. "The less liquidity you have the less it takes to push the market around," the source says, magnifying the effect of Farage's statements. "You literally need to know nothing other than what a correctly uttered phrase would do to the market."</p><p>Patel agrees: "Even the smallest of players could drive the price" because liquidity was so low.</p><p>Farage laughed out loud when Business Insider discussed the theory with him. "I think the Russians might have done it! ... I personally made $200 million!" he said. "You're all off your heads!"</p><p><em>If you have any information on who shorted the pound - and why - on the night of the Brexit vote please email jedwards@businessinsider.com. Correspondence will be treated in confidence.</em></p> <p class="tagline">Our Brexit Insider Facebook group is the best place for up-to-date news and analysis about Britain's departure from the EU, direct from Business Insider's political reporters. Join <a href="https://www.facebook.com/groups/267178180471848/">here.</a></p>    <div class="margin-top">        <h3>NOW WATCH: <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/lebron-james-spends-millions-cleveland-cavs-nba-finals-champions-2016-6">How LeBron James makes and spends his millions</a></h3>        <div>                    </div>    </div>

FX traders tell us why they're still talking about Nigel Farage and the 'crackpot lunatic conspiracy theory' of a massive short against the pound on the night of the Brexit vote

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