[gaa_ian (Ian)]

This is an extract from an article on the risk of increased cometary impact due to the passage of the sun through the Galactic plane:

Researchers at the Cardiff Centre of Astrobiology have built a computer model of the Solar System's journey around the Milky Way. Instead of making a perfectly flat orbit around the galaxy's centre, it actually bounces up and down. At times it can rise right up out of the galactic plane - getting 100 light years above - and then dip down below it. They calculated that we pass through the plane every 35 to 40 million years.

And this time period seems to match dangerous periods of impacts on Earth. According to the number and age of craters on Earth, we seem to suffer increased impacts every 36 million years. Uh oh, that's a match.

In fact, one of these high points of comet activity would have been 65 million years - the same time that an asteroid strike wiped out the dinosaurs.

And here's the bad news. According to their calculations, the Solar System will be passing through the galactic plane in the near future, and should see an increased risk of impact. Our risk of impact could increase 10-fold.

Could we be experiencing the early effects of this already, with the increase in Comet activity we are seeing ATM ?
PANNstars, Lemmon, Ison and now the potential Mars impacting comet.
If I am way off the mark, please do elaborate !