The hammer of God - Arthur C. Clarke

It is an amateur astronomer on Mars who first spots the previously unchartered asteroid, falling sunwards. And when the scientists of project Spaceguard compute its orbit, they christen it Kali, the Hindu goddess of destruction.

It is 2109, sixty-five million years since the reign of the giant reptiles was ended. And now Kali threatens a similar fate for mankind. As Captain of the research vessel, Goliath, Robert Singh is in charge of an operation that has been long planned but never before put into action - the immense task of pushing an asteroid off its course. But even the most meticulous planning cannot anticipate the human factor.

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