If an asteroid is determined to be on an Earth-impacting trajectory, scientists typically want to stage a deflection, where the asteroid is gently nudged by a relatively small change in velocity, while keeping the bulk of the asteroid together.
A kinetic impactor or a standoff nuclear explosion can achieve a deflection. However, if the warning time is too short to stage a successful deflection, another option is to couple a lot of energy to the asteroid and break it up into many well-dispersed fragments...
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