Firstly, its not possible to "ignite" Saturn with a space probe, or a nuke, or several hundred nukes - of any kind. I refer the honourable readers to comet Shomaker-Levy 9, and the overall effect and force of explosions that occurred when it hit Jupiter.

Secondly, unless the shuttle was armed with some missile that was capable of "impulse" drive or some other such sub-light speed, theres no way anything that it could take into space could make a difference to a comet so far out in such a short space of time - if we had that kind of engine we wouldn't be sending 7 people up vertically strapped to the equivalent of a small hydrogen bomb, would we?

Whats more probable is that this comet has a unique composition, possibly it has a hollow core and on its outward leg it accumulates an awful lot of ice and dust which forms a shell over the core and prevents outgassing until the outer shell is stripped away by incresing temperature and the solar wind as it approaches the the sun and then the object starts to outgas massively, hence the sudden "flare" - a bit like a meteor hitting the earths atmosphere.

Good thinking neforemore.

Makes sense to me.

As for the "turning Saturn/Jupiter" into a second sun, there is another problem to overcome. The Sun itself is in a state of balance. The explosive force of the fusion reaction is in equilibrium with the gravitational pull off it's mass.

Now, bearing this in mind, we shall move on to Jupiter or Saturn.

In order to ignite Fusion in one of those planets, you would need so much energy that it's release (and the subsequent outburst of energy from the fusion reaction itself) would literally blow the planets apart, extinguishing any attempt to turn them into a second Sun.

You would need alot of energy as the natural pressure in the core of the planets mass is woefully insufficient to trigger a fusion reaction, requiring alot of energy to kick start it.

This is also why on earth we require temperatures a million times hotter than the centre of the sun to create fusion because we lack the mass to compensate.

Copernicus, how the hell can you actually believe that scientists can actually turn the Jupiter or Saturn into another sun. This is probably the craziest thing I have ever seen you post here. Theres nothing in the known universe that will even make that possible. Saturn is so light, that if it was small enough it would float in water which makes it more likely for earth to be turned into a sun as its heavier. And how can a comet be bigger than Jupiter? Correct me if I am wrong, but dont celestial bodies that large have their own gravity field. meaning that every time the comet passes it will pull something with it? Crazy, crazy, crazy talk

PS. Sorry to go off topic and interesting article

[edit on 29/10/2007 by OzWeatherman]

I've heard that Comet McNaught and Comet Arend can now be seen in the same area of Comet Holmes. I don't know if that is unusual and I understand that only Holmes can be seen by the naked eye, but it's pretty cool in my mind.

I went outside to see it and took some pictures with my camera. I'll post them up in a bit when I'm done stacking them.

Oops, no offense there Vikturtle, I did not realize you were the author of that article.

It's not badly written at all! It's just not informed, and for people to read that and think oh no, the comet is going to hit the earth, and then we have people saying that Saturn is going to turn into a sun.. and so on and so forth.
It's not cool.

Originally posted by neformore

Whats more probable is that this comet has a unique composition, possibly it has a hollow core and on its outward leg it accumulates an awful lot of ice and dust which forms a shell over the core and prevents outgassing until the outer shell is stripped away by incresing temperature and the solar wind as it approaches the the sun and then the object starts to outgas massively, hence the sudden "flare" - a bit like a meteor hitting the earths atmosphere.

One problem with that is that is should then have a tail bigger than a kite's.

The fact that it doesn't have a tail suggests very high integrity & cohesion by whatever makes it up. So I posit its composition is very crystalline, could be metal, and the explosion is partly due to how it is angled & its surface unusually high reflectivity lighting up what little ice the solar wind could churn up that could cling to to it during its outward leg.

So, its all probably just smoke & mirrors, my friend.

That isn't to say that a natural phenomena isn't being used by a higher power as a sign for us.

What a great post! Tom, what equipment did you use to take that photo? I have been wanting to get in to space photography for a while now but it's pretty deep stuff. I have an Orion catalog that I have been tempted to order from are they any good?

Also where can I look in the sky with my naked eye to see this? Thanks!

Originally posted by Recluse420
What a great post! Tom, what equipment did you use to take that photo? I have been wanting to get in to space photography for a while now but it's pretty deep stuff. I have an Orion catalog that I have been tempted to order from are they any good?

Also where can I look in the sky with my naked eye to see this? Thanks!

It's northeast right now, probably around half between zenith (very top of sky) and horizon. Maybe more now, I don't know. It appears to be a triangle (careful not to look at the bigger triangle looking constellation more north and more towards the top of the sky). It's fairly bright, and it's the bottom left star of the triangle. It doesn't appear to be a normal star, but fuzzy. It's orangeish also.

The equipment I used was just a Nikon D50 @ ISO1600, a Nikon 70-200mm F2.8 AF-S ED-IF VR, @200mm. Stacked 50 frames and 11 darks for a total of 1m 46s exposure.

i guess u can't see it from australia?

Originally posted by ..AuStRaLiA..
i guess u can't see it from australia?

Yep you can. I know a lot of Australian amateur astronomers who have gotten images of it.

I just went out with some binoculars and couldn't see it, damn Denver and it's star blocking lights. I really wanted to see it for my self. Someone please come EMP our power grid, I don't have enough gas to drive out east right now. lol

Well we also have smoke from the California fires blowing in as well thats blocking out a lot of the sky.

Great photos by the way! I can only imagine what it would look like if it got as bright as the moon.

[edit on 29-10-2007 by Slash]