Changing a likely hit to a likely miss by an asteroid

LIVERMORE - For decades, fusion power has remained an elusive Holy Grail for the scientific community - the stuff of science fiction novels or Darth Vader's "Death Star."

But not at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory's stadium-sized National Ignition Facility (NIF). There, research teams hope to gain access to sustained fusion, and other scientific firsts, for the first time outside a Hollywood movie set or a thermonuclear weapons test.

When completed, a 192-beam instrument is expected to be both the world's largest and its most intense laser, capable of creating temperatures and pressures similar to those inside stars....

~If we can focus the 192 laser beams on a potential killer asteroid, we can vaporize a small dent in the asteroid that will behave like a jet engine, (vaporized rock is ejection mass) propelling the asteroid in the opposite direction, thus changing a probable hit to a probable miss. Does anyone think the spot can be very small, but very hot at a range of 10 million miles? There is the matter of getting the 192 laser array into solar orbit. If it saves 6 billion humans, it is likely money well spent even at one trillion dollars. Neil ~