CNN anchor suggests meteor hurtling toward Earth could be a result of global warming



A CNN anchor has asked on live television whether a meteor hurtling past Earth was the result of global warming.



Deborah Feyeric made the faux pas when she transitioned from a discussion about global warming and the blizzard that struck to east coast into a a segment about Asteroid 2012 DA14 - which is projected to pass just 17,200 miles from Earth on Friday.

'We want to bring in our science guy, Bill Nye, and talk about something else that’s falling from the sky, and that is an asteroid,' Feyerick says. 'What’s coming our way? Is this the effect of, perhaps, global warming? Or is this just some meteoric occasion?'

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Startling: CNN host Deborah Feyerick asked Bill Nye the Science Guy if an asteroid hurtling toward Earth was the result of global warming

Nye, who has an engineering degree from Cornell University, tries to cut Feyerick off before she even finishes asking the question.



'No, no, no,' he says.

For a moment, he fumbles to answer the ridiculous question.



'... except it’s all science. The word meteorology and the word meteor come from the same root, so, uhh...' he says.

Nye, who applied several times to become a NASA astronaut, seems flabbergasted that the CNN anchor seemed to equate a climatological phenomenon on Earth with an astronomical object traveling through the solar system.



Feyerick, who has worked for CNN for nearly 13 years, graduated from Columbia University in New York City with a degree in English literature.



Close shave: This NASA illustration shows Asteroid 2012 DA14, which will pass within Earth's orbit on Friday

Popular Science noted that Nye was charitable to his fellow Ivy League grad as he answered her preposterous question.



'Nye was good enough to respond with what sounded like a non-sequitur... instead of saying, "No, dummy,"' noted Popular Science.



The asteroid in question, 2012 DA15, is about 150 feet wide and will be passing closer to Earth than the orbit of many satellites - a close shave by astronomical standards.

If it stuck the surface of the planet, it would likely impact with a force 1,000 times greater than the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima, Japan.



A similar meteorite strike in a remote part of Russia in 1908 flattened 820 square miles of forest.