Imagine a rock large enough to span Douglas Harbour to the Tower of Refuge. That's big. Now imagine that same rock arriving with a closing speed of some 12.5 km per second, or 28,000 miles per hour. In local terms, Ramsey to Douglas in 2 seconds. Now that's scary, even for TT riders!

Such would be the energy released that not only would the Isle of Man be wiped off the map, but fairly serious consequences for a substantial area of the rest of the planet would follow. Fortunately, this one will miss the Earth, but you can simulate the effect of it impacting at killerasteroids.org, and enter details as suggested below.

• Select "Asteroid" and "Medium"
• For custom location, enter "Douglas, Isle of Man" or whatever destination takes your fancy, and then press "Done"
• Finally, press "Go", and enjoy!

The picture above is intended to be representative of the size of the asteroid only. Such an object impacting the Earth would never be seen other than as a momentary blinding light because of the approach speed. Nor would it be heard as it approached for it would be travelling many times faster than the speed of sound, with an enormous bow/shockwave accompanying it.

NASA scientists believe that an asteroid measuring between 6 to 12 miles in diameter, impacted Earth some 64.98 million years ago at Chicxulub, Yucatan Peninsula, Mexico, resulting in half a year of total darkness, and the loss of half of all species including the dinosaurs. Visit killerasteroids.org to gain a better perspective of the event. For more information on asteroid impacts, take a look at the List of impact craters on Earth to see some of the evidence of former impacts upon our planet.