This won't be an asteroid impact. Rather, observers have found a large space rock, or micro-asteroid, that will run into Earth's atmosphere over northern Sudan at 2:46 Tuesday, or 10:46 eastern daylight time tonight. See the announcement from the Near Earth Object Program at JPL.

The object is less than 5 meters across and is not expected to do anything more than make a spectacular fireball in the upper atmosphere, possibly followed by a loud boom. It will come in from the northeast about 19 degrees above the horizon and move southwest at about 13 kilometers per second. In this telescopic image, the meteoroid is the dot in the center, surrounded by stars that are smeared as the telescope tracks the rock. It was discovered by the Catalina Sky Survey last night.

Cosmic impacts happen all the time, and events of this size happen about a dozen times per year. But this is the first time one has been spotted ahead of time. Oh yes, and on the Torino scale of cosmic impact hazard, this one will rate a zero—good for a show, with no hazard expected for anyone.

Image courtesy Harvard Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics

The Earth Science Literacy Initiative makes my ears prick up—its goal is a consensus document on the "the big ideas and supporting concepts essential for an earth system literate public." This week the folks at www.earthscienceliteracy.org have posted a working draft of the eight big ideas, each with nine supporting concepts. Feed your mind and feed back your comments during the rest of October.

The U.S. Geological Survey has a long and distinguished history, but one lasting blemish on its record was the "reduction in force" or RIF of 1995, when more than one-third of its work force was laid off. A peculiarly large proportion of those laid off were senior scientists. Allegations of age discrimination arose immediately. As I recall, one employee who began collecting and discussing evidence was unexpectedly promoted into a position in which he could no longer speak out. Eventually people went to court, and three weeks ago the 9th US Circuit Court of Appeals ruled for James Calzia and Chet Wrucke. Wrangling continues, but this landmark was reported in the San Francisco Chronicle, and a commenter added links to court documents. Apologies for those readers who consider this old news, but for many others the memories are fresh, and the damage to the agency's collegiality was lasting.

Next month the 2008 Nobel Prize winners will be announced, and thanks to Alfred Nobel the honorees will include physicists, medical researchers and chemists but not geoscientists. I've gotten over that, really I have, because there are other prestigious prizes for them. But the wound is fresh when it comes to the annual Ig Nobel prizes, awarded by the Annals of Improbable Research or AIG. This year's winners have just been announced, and they include such worthies as the researchers who determined that slime molds can solve puzzles, but surely geologists have produced absurd and obvious research during the past year. I . . . just can't think of any.

One place that geologists would fit in beautifully is the AIG's Luxuriant Flowing Hair Club for Scientists; indeed, last week's MacArthur genius, David Montgomery, should be in it. They include beards, too, making large numbers of historic and current geologists eligible.