(End of the American Dream)—On April 13th, 2029 an absolutely gigantic asteroid known as “Apophis” will come very close to our planet. In fact, we are being told that Apophis will actually be ten times closer than the Moon as it zips past the Earth. The good news is that scientists are assuring us that there is zero chance that this enormous space rock will hit us. The bad news is that we cannot see Apophis right now, and if there is even the slightest change in the projected trajectory it could end up slamming into our planet. Needless to say, if Apophis actually hits us it would be an absolutely cataclysmic disaster.
For years, I did not think much about Apophis because I simply trusted what the “experts” were telling us.
For example, NASA is unequivocally stating that “there is no risk of Apophis impacting our planet for at least a century”…
Asteroid 99942 Apophis is a near-Earth object (NEO) estimated to be about 1,100 feet (335 meters) across.
When it was discovered in 2004, Apophis was identified as one of the most hazardous asteroids that could impact Earth. But that impact assessment changed after astronomers tracked Apophis, and its orbit became better determined.
A radar observation campaign in March 2021, combined with precise orbit analysis, allowed astronomers to conclude that there is no risk of Apophis impacting our planet for at least a century.
That seems quite clear. NASA is promising us that we do not have to worry about this giant space rock at all.
A planetary scientist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology is telling us the exact same thing…
“Apophis is in the category of Potentially Hazardous Asteroids (PHAs) — asteroids with orbits that bring them very close to Earth now and for centuries in the future,” said Richard Binzel, a planetary scientist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. “What makes Apophis the poster child for potentially hazardous asteroids is that it will make the closest known approach to Earth of any large asteroid this decade.
“But the three most important things about Apophis are: Apophis will miss the Earth. Apophis will miss the Earth. Apophis will miss the Earth,” he told Space.com via email.
If our top experts are this confident, why are some people out there still concerned about Apophis?
Well, it turns out that there are several reasons.
First of all, this giant space rock is going to come extremely close to our planet.
In fact, we are being told that it will be “less than one-tenth the distance to the Moon” as it flies by us…
It will be a very close pass. Apophis will come within about 32,000 kilometers (20,000 miles) of Earth — less than one-tenth the distance to the Moon. The asteroid will fly below the altitude of some satellites, but should arrive on a trajectory that makes any collision highly unlikely.
In astronomical terms, that is a really, really close shave. In all of human history, we have never had a giant space rock come so close to us.
Secondly, we cannot actually see Apophis right now.
We have not been able to see Apophis since the middle of 2021 and we will not be able to see it again until 2027…
There is another problem. “Apophis is in the daytime sky and unobservable from mid-2021 to 2027,” Paul Wiegert, meaning any change in its trajectory will go unseen until just two years before April 12, 2029. However, he adds that a single observation during 2027 would be necessary to determine whether the asteroid threatened “an impending Earth impact.”
If there is the slightest change in the trajectory of Apophis, it could hit us.
And we will not know if the trajectory of Apophis has changed until we are able to view it in 2027.
For the moment, our scientists are assuming that the trajectory of Apophis has not been altered at all, and that is what they are basing their optimistic forecasts on.
Thirdly, everyone agrees that Earth’s gravitational pull will have an impact on Apophis.
One way that our planet’s gravity will affect Apophis is by causing small tremors…
The researchers discovered that two physical processes — triggered by Earth’s gravitational tugs — will likely sculpt Apophis’ surface during its 2029 encounter. One is tremors that will probably begin an hour before Apophis reaches its closest point to Earth and continue for a short while after.
The tremors’ strength is difficult to estimate, Ballouz said. However, “Apophis’ gravity is about 250,000 times smaller than Earth’s,” he added. “So, we think that events of much smaller magnitude could plausibly shake things up on its surface.”
Could those tremors alter the trajectory of Apophis enough for it to hit our planet?
I don’t know.
We are also being told that the gravity of our planet could change how Apophis is “tumbling” through the sky…
The other process that could “refresh” Apophis’ surface is a change in its tumbling. Tumbling occurs because the asteroid doesn’t rotate on a fixed axis or time period; instead, it tumbles through space like a badly thrown football.
An unrelated 2023 study showed that Earth’s gravity would cause the asteroid to rotate either more quickly or more slowly depending on its orientation during the 2029 approach. The new simulations confirmed this finding. They also revealed that the changes in Apophis’ tumbling will cause the sloping faces of surface rocks to destabilize, potentially triggering landslides in extreme cases.
I always assumed that Apophis was sailing peacefully through the heavens in a very calm manner. But it isn’t.
It is actually tumbling along quite violently, and if the spin rate of the asteroid changes just slightly that could change everything.
According to Professor Gareth Collins, if Apophis actually hits our planet the amount of energy released would be “equivalent to the explosive yield of the global nuclear arsenal”…
Collins estimates that if Apophis were to strike Earth at 45,000 mph (72,000 km/h) — the average speed of asteroid impacts — the energy released would be about 10 billion, billion joules (a 1 followed by 19 zeros). “This is equivalent to the explosive yield of the global nuclear arsenal,” he said. “About 100,000 times more than the energy of the Chelyabinsk meteor and a million times more energy than the bombs dropped on Hiroshima.”
Can you imagine what that would look like?
When Neil deGrasse Tyson was asked about such a scenario, he warned that Apophis had the potential to create a tsunami that would wipe out the entire west coast of the United States…
Famous astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson, in an episode of his podcast ‘Cosmic Queries’ discussed a threat posed by giant asteroids heading towards the Earth. In conversation with science author and cosmochemist Natalie Starkey, Tyson warned that a 370-metre wide near-Earth asteroid Apophis 99942 might spark a major tsunami that can wipe out the entire west coast of North America if it manages to hit the Earth.
That is crazy.
A wall of water hundreds of feet high would hit the west coast at blinding speed, and Tyson claims that virtually everything in the path of this wall of water would be instantly destroyed…
Tyson went on to explain how an impact in the ocean would trigger a tsunami, “If it goes through the centre, it will plunge down into the Pacific Ocean to a depth of three miles, at which point it explodes, caveating the Pacific in a hole that’s three miles wide. The 5 km-high wall collapses, falling back against itself and rising high into the atmosphere before falling back down to the ocean, generating tsunami waves.”
“So now you make a cavity a second time. This cycle takes about 50 seconds, you can calculate it,” Tyson added. “All the artificial stuff, all the houses, factories, they get churned into the force that sandblasts the entire west coast of North America clean.”
And because so much material would be thrown up into the atmosphere, there would be a period of global cooling that would spark a long-term global famine…
The long-term effects would be even more devastating, with widespread famine, disease, and mass extinction of plant and animal life. The impact would likely cause a mass extinction event, similar to the one that wiped out the dinosaurs.
So we better hope that this giant space rock does not hit us.
And for now, our top experts are assuring us that it will not.
But it is interesting to note that the European Space Agency will be sending a robotic spacecraft to “rendezvous with the asteroid in February 2029”…
The European Space Agency has given the go-ahead for initial work on a mission to visit an asteroid called (99942) Apophis. If approved at a key meeting next year, the robotic spacecraft, known as the Rapid Apophis Mission for Space Safety (Ramses), will rendezvous with the asteroid in February 2029.
Do they know something that we don’t?
Interestingly, Apophis was named after the Egyptian god of chaos, and it is approaching at a time when our entire planet is descending into a state of great chaos.
Hopefully our top experts are correct.
Hopefully this giant space rock will fly past our planet without causing a problem.
But for now we have no way of seeing it, and even the slightest change in trajectory could have absolutely enormous implications for all of us.
Michael’s new book entitled “Why” is available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.com, and you can subscribe to his Substack newsletter at michaeltsnyder.substack.com.
Two Storms, One Harvest
Every food crisis in living memory has been a one-shock event. The 2008 price spike was a commodity bubble. The 2020 shortages were a logistics failure. The 2022 grain scare was a war on one exporter’s ports. Each time, the system bent, adjusted, and recovered, and each time the experts assured us afterward that global markets are simply too big and too diversified to fail.
What nobody in Washington seems eager to discuss is that 2026 is shaping up to be something the modern food system has never actually faced. Two independent shocks, one climatic and one geopolitical, are converging on the same harvest cycle at the same time. Not sequentially. Simultaneously.
Start with the weather. The Pacific Ocean is currently building toward what forecasters now openly call a record event. NOAA’s Climate Prediction Center puts the odds of at least a strong El Niño near 88 percent, with roughly two in three odds it reaches “very strong” status, the tier reserved for perhaps three or four events in the entire satellite era. Every major global model now projects a median peak in Super El Niño territory, and most of them project it exceeding the 2015-16 event, which until now held the modern record. Sea surface anomalies were already brushing the super threshold in mid-July, months before these events normally peak. The atmosphere has already shifted into El Niño mode, and the event is forecast to crest in late fall and early winter.
This is not about “climate change.” It’s about the standard cycles of weather, and the cycle we’re currently in is one that has likely devastated societies in the past. We’re better prepared as a society today, but not all Americans are equally prepared.
Serious households have started doing the quiet math on their own. Grocery bills tell part of the story, and the forecast maps tell the rest, which is why long-term food storage has moved from fringe hobby to mainstream line item in the family budget, with established suppliers like Heaven’s Harvest seeing demand from people who five years ago would have rolled their eyes at the idea. That instinct is not paranoia. It is pattern recognition, and the pattern is worth walking through carefully.
Editor’s Note: Heaven’s Harvest IS a sponsor, but the warnings of this article are real and would be written even if we didn’t have a survival food sponsor. With that said, those who take advantage of what they offer can use promo code “Patriot” for 15% off.
The Fertilizer Clock Is Already Running
While the Pacific warms, the second shock has been unfolding in the Strait of Hormuz. The conflict with Iran turned the world’s most important energy chokepoint into a contested waterway, and the consequences reach far beyond the gas pump. Roughly a third of global fertilizer trade moves through Hormuz, and the disruption sent urea prices up 86 percent year over year by March, with a 53 percent jump in a single month.
The World Bank projects energy prices rising about 24 percent in 2026 and fertilizer about 31 percent. By its own accounting, fertilizer prices ran 35 percent higher in the first five months of this year than the same period last year.
Here is the mechanism the nightly news will not explain. Fertilizer is not a grocery item. It is a time-delayed input. The nitrogen a farmer in Iowa or Punjab could not afford to apply this spring does not show up as a problem this spring. It shows up as a thinner harvest six to twelve months later.
The World Bank’s own food security brief concedes that the effects of reduced applications earlier this season “are likely to become visible only later in harvest outcomes.” Translate that from institutional language into plain English and it means this. The damage is already done, it is already in the ground, and we are simply waiting for it to arrive on the shelf.
Now check the calendar. Six to twelve months from the spring planting season lands us squarely in late 2026 and early 2027. Which is precisely when the strongest El Niño in the instrumental record is forecast to peak, bringing its signature droughts to Southeast Asia, Australia, southern Africa, northern Brazil, and South Asia, the very regions that grow the world’s rice, sugar, and oilseeds.
The World Bank warns openly that a strong El Niño “could disrupt multiple crop belts simultaneously” on top of the conflict-driven input costs. Their baseline projection assumes the Middle East disruptions ease by autumn. What in the last two years of Middle East history suggests that assumption is safe?
The System Has No Slack Left
The comfortable answer is that global markets always adjust. But adjustment requires slack, and the slack is gone. Global cereal production is expected to decline from last year’s records even before El Niño does its work. The UN World Food Programme, hardly a den of right-wing preppers, is calling this the most significant disruption to its supply chains since Covid and the invasion of Ukraine, and its supply chain director put the stakes bluntly.
Today’s supply chain challenges are tomorrow’s hunger crisis.
There is also a political dimension that markets cannot price. When food gets scarce, governments do not behave like economists. They behave like politicians. Export bans, hoarding mandates, and panic buying at the national level turned the modest rice shortfall of 2008 into a global crisis, and analysts are already warning that import-dependent nations are the first dominoes.
The 2015-16 Super El Niño, a far weaker event than what is now forecast, threw tens of millions into food stress across Africa and Asia. This one is projected to be stronger, and it arrives with fertilizer already rationed by price and shipping lanes already contested by missiles.
What Joseph Knew
Scripture does not treat preparation for lean years as faithlessness. It treats it as wisdom delivered in advance to those willing to act on it.
Behold, there come seven years of great plenty throughout all the land of Egypt: And there shall arise after them seven years of famine; and all the plenty shall be forgotten in the land of Egypt.
Joseph did not respond to that warning with a hashtag or a committee. He stored grain during the years of abundance, and when the famine came, Egypt stood while its neighbors begged. The lesson is not that famine is certain. It is that the time to prepare is precisely when preparation still looks optional.
Nobody who filled a pantry in a year of plenty has ever regretted it, and nobody standing in an empty aisle has ever been glad he waited for certainty.
None of this calls for panic, and panic is the enemy of sound judgment anyway. It calls for the same unglamorous prudence our grandparents considered ordinary. Keep some cash margin, know your local growers, and put real food in deep storage while it is cheap and available, because the entire arc of this story is that cheap and available is a closing window.
Families looking for a straightforward place to start can visit Heaven’s Harvest and use promo code Patriot for 15 percent off long-term storable food. The forecasts may yet soften, the strait may yet reopen, and we should pray they do. But hope is a fine thing to hold and a foolish thing to eat.
