Iceland volcano professor hits back at eruption scare stories (But What About the Near Earth Asteroids?)

Guilty.
Not Guilty.

From IceNews:

The Icelandic geophysicist, Professor Pall Einarsson, whose words have caused something of an international volcano scare, says he is dumbfounded by how much his message has changed in translation. Pall Einarsson was interviewed by Icelandic broadcaster RUV in Icelandic about a series of earthquakes in the highlands.The interview was then translated and used by Britain’s Daily Telegraph, among others. Since then the message has morphed out of all recognition, Einarsson says.


“It is really strange how this news came into existence. I wasn’t even warning of a likely eruption at Bardarbunga [in the interview],” he told IceNews. “The things I emphasised in my interview with RUV’s Bjorn Malmqvist were that the earthquakes at Bardarbunga and Kistufell last week are not unusual, there are often movements there, and sometimes much bigger than this....MORE

From SpaceWeather:

Near Earth Asteroids
Potentially Hazardous Asteroids (PHAs) are space rocks larger than approximately 100m that can come closer to Earth than 0.05 AU. None of the known PHAs is on a collision course with our planet, although astronomers are finding new ones all the time.

On February 11, 2011 there were 1196 potentially hazardous asteroids.

Recent & Upcoming Earth-asteroid encounters:

Asteroid	Date(UT)	Miss Distance	Mag.	Size
2011 CF22	Feb 6	0.1 LD	--	3 m
2011 CA7	Feb 9	0.3 LD	--	4 m
2011 CZ3	Feb 10	2.5 LD	--	24 m
2003 YG118	Feb 20	67.7 LD	--	1.8 km
2000 PN9	Mar 10	45.5 LD	--	2.6 km
2002 DB4	Apr 15	62.5 LD	--	2.2 km
2008 UC202	Apr 27	8.9 LD	--	10 m
2009 UK20	May 2	8.6 LD	--	23 m
2008 FU6	May 5	75.5 LD	--	1.2 km
2003 YT1	May 5	65.3 LD	--	2.5 km
2002 JC	Jun 1	57.5 LD	--	1.6 km
2009 BD	Jun 2	0.9 LD	--	9 m

Notes: LD means "Lunar Distance." 1 LD = 384,401 km, the distance between Earth and the Moon. 1 LD also equals 0.00256 AU. MAG is the visual magnitude of the asteroid on the date of closest approach.