ask me anything astronomical

ok how about the Article in Maxim magazine? On Sept 27 we have a 63.8 chance on being hit by an asteroid.

Anyone read it?

Hmmm Hmmm?

Originally posted by favouriteslave
ok how about the Article in Maxim magazine? On Sept 27 we have a 63.8 chance on being hit by an asteroid.

Anyone read it?

Hmmm Hmmm?

i don't read maxim, and i wouldn't really go there for anything scientific... but could you summarize or perhaps find an online version of the article?

and the earth always has a chance of being hit by something. it's always getting hit by some debris. if you live near a beach, get a big magnet and run t right over the surface of the sand. you'll get tons of little particles on your magnet that are the remnants of meteorites.

Well it doesn't elaborate much on where they got the info but my husband pointed it out to me today.




Impact!

The good news? An asteroid the size of SL-617 only hits our planet once every 10 million years. The bad news? Scientists give it a 63.8 percent chance of colliding with Earth on September 27 this year. So how bad�s it gonna sting?

Maxim, April 2004

1 One second before impact
You can finally see the asteroid with the naked eye, and it�s impressive�an enormous fireball entering the atmosphere much faster than a bullet. The air beneath the meteor compresses, heating up to 60,000 degrees Kelvin�10 times the surface temperature of the sun�immediately incinerating everything in its path.

2 Moment of impact
The meteorite plows into the Earth�s fragile crust. Chances are good it will hit an uninhabited area, like an ocean or Antarctica. But let�s say it plows into the suddenly ironic town of Dodge City, Kansas, vaporizing on impact and killing everything within 200 miles. The blast, as powerful as a million megatons of TNT, digs out a crater 25 miles across, blowing over half a billion tons of rock and soil into the air, some of it all the way to space.

3 One second after impact
The shock wave expands outward at close to the speed of light. Everything within 400 miles of impact spontaneously combusts. People lucky enough to live outside the zone of immediate devastation see a blinding flash.

4 Two seconds after impact
A black wall of rock, soil, and bits of debris rises up from the ground to the sky and spreads outward at thousands of miles per hour. It actually moves faster than the speed of sound, so people in its path don�t hear a thing before they�re obliterated.

5 One minute after impact
Everything standing is flattened, and almost every living thing within 600 miles of Dodge City is killed (that includes Albuquerque, Denver, Minneapolis, St. Paul, Des Moines, Omaha, Kansas City, St. Louis, Memphis, Little Rock, Wichita, Houston, Dallas, and San Antonio). The ground behind the wave of destruction is scoured by 300 mph winds.

6 Two minutes after impact
People 1,000 miles away get nailed by projectiles. The meteorite�s impact causes a global string of volcano eruptions and earthquakes. These then trigger giant tsunamis hundreds of feet high�say goodbye to Miami, New Orleans, Holland.

7 One hour after impact
What goes up must come down. Flaming rock and ash fall like rain on everything within 1,000 miles of the impact site, setting aflame anything still standing in an area stretching all the way from Chicago to Las Vegas.

8 One day after impact
As many as a billion people are already dead. To make matters worse, the meteor�s entry tears up the atmosphere, crippling communications worldwide�so survivors have no way of knowing what�s going on.

9 One week after impact
Most of the planet is now dark, as a huge black blanket of ash blots out the sun, plunging the entire Earth into months of continuous night.

10 One month after impact
Acid rain falls across the globe. With most plant life dead, almost the entire population that survived to this point starves to death (or is ravaged by cancer, as the ozone layer is effectively destroyed). And things don�t get better for awhile�the effects of the impact that probably killed the dinosaurs lasted for 10,000 years.

well... that does summarize what an impact would be like. that's some good infor from maxim, at least. but in searching through NASA's NEO program i couldn't find anything with the name SL-617. so i dunno.

update on your question favouriteslave...

the asteroid is the asteroid SL-617 is also known as the asteroid Toutatis. it'll be passing 4 lunar distance, or 1,537,604 kilometers.

So in laymans terms, it that gonna hit us?

Originally posted by favouriteslave
So in laymans terms, it that gonna hit us?

i would have to say no... stuff has passed a lot closer and never hit us. plus, 4 lunar distances means it's four times away from the earth as the moon is. so it'll be pretty far out there.

BUMP!

c'mon people. i'm sure there's questions come of you haven't asked but want to know answers to! deny my boredom!

Hey KeenKid, sorry bout the delay (was spring breaking). Thx for the hydrocarbon info btw, im still looking though in case you stumble on anything.

Here is a question that relates to photons (which is not quite astronomical, more physical, but certainly is something astronomers concern themselves with):

Do Photons have mass?

Whew... lot of build up to a simple question. Here are some follow-ups though:

1. Can a physical particle have no mass?
2. Can a particle with no mass be affected by gravity?
3. E=MC^2 and all.. so can a massless particle impart energy?

Originally posted by Cascadego
Hey KeenKid, sorry bout the delay (was spring breaking). Thx for the hydrocarbon info btw, im still looking though in case you stumble on anything.

no problem at all. in fact, had i not come back here to bump the thread now i wouldn't have seen your post!

Do Photons have mass?

according to the current definition of mass, no. this is because mass is measured when an object is at rest, while photons are always moving, and at the speed of light at that!

1. Can a physical particle have no mass?

technically no, but then there's the paradox of the photon. perhaps it's time we redefine mass?

2. Can a particle with no mass be affected by gravity?

well photons are affected by the effects of einstienian space. the gravity well of a star would curve space around it, so any photons would follow this curve.

3. E=MC^2 and all.. so can a massless particle impart energy?

going by einstein's work? no, since the mass would equal zero it would mean no energy. going by string theory, i would think that yes, since this energy would be transmit on the quantum level.

Here's a couple of questions i have.

1. Is it possible to enter a black hole without being squished? And if so, what would 'outsiders' of the hole see in your red shift?

2.What exactly are quasars and pulsars? I saw some show where they said quasars are at the edge of the universe and they said they are possible white holes...

3. I know there are red, blue, and yellow stars. So what would a red or a blue star in our solar system have on the planet earth?

4. If black holes have infinite gravity and condenses all the matter, how come the don't overflow eventually and implode/explode?

Anyway, that's all I got. They probably sound pretty elementary but I've been into astronomy forever and have never gotten really clear answers. Thanks for your time.

Whats a good link about that new 'planet' they found, and isnt it coming close to us? In september maybe?

Originally posted by Dark_Acid
1. Is it possible to enter a black hole without being squished? And if so, what would 'outsiders' of the hole see in your red shift?

actually, as you enter a black hole you would get stretched out. this would be because the gravity increases at a highly exponential rate. think of something like a slinky, stretching out in a curve... something similar to that. it would be upon entering the veritable "point of no return" for when you would be squished. and as for anyone seeing anything? i would have no idea... i'm sure at one point you would just disappear out of existence.

2.What exactly are quasars and pulsars? I saw some show where they said quasars are at the edge of the universe and they said they are possible white holes...

quasars, from what i know, are galaxies at the very beginning of their formation. and yeah, they are at and around the edge of the universe that humanity can see.

pulsars rotating neutron stars, which formed from supernovae. as the star rotates, it gives off beams of radiation. think of a lighthouse, sweeping out a beam of light. all neutron stars rotate, due to their high mass (conservation of angular momentum). technically, because of this, all neutron stars are pulsars. only some are designated as pulsars because the beams of radiation hit the earth.

3. I know there are red, blue, and yellow stars. So what would a red or a blue star in our solar system have on the planet earth?

there are several types of colors stars. red, orange, yellow, yellow-white, white, blue, and bright blue. red can be associated to giants, supergiants, and dwarf stars, and blue can be associated with blue giant stars.

if a giant or supergiant star were actually in our solar system, that would pose a MAJOR problem... mainly because it would more than likely destroy the earth, along with pretty much everything else. a giant star where the sun is would reach out to about earth's orbit. a supergiant, out to jupiter's.

if a dwarf star were in the solar system, it could be what causes the orbits of kuiper belt objects. if it were nearer, it could possibly steal a planet from the sun into its orbit.

4. If black holes have infinite gravity and condenses all the matter, how come the don't overflow eventually and implode/explode?

they don't implode on themselves because that's what they are already. blackholes were stars at one point. instead of forming a neutron star though, they continue to collapse into themselves to form a black hole. think of trying to implode an already imploded building.

nothing as a bad question! and i hope that cleared up any bad answers or anything that was previously left out. if you have anything more, please do ask!

oh, i almost forgot. you can listen to radiosignals from pulsars, black holes, and other celestial bodies at www.spacesounds.com.... some of them are very errie (like the slower of the pulsars). also, some are quiet, so you'll have to have your sound up.

Originally posted by aware
Whats a good link about that new 'planet' they found, and isnt it coming close to us? In september maybe?

www.gps.caltech.edu...

www.space.com...

www.nasa.gov...

i just did a google search. those were the best three i saw though, in no order. probably the space.com one is the best. and no, it won't be coming close to us ever really.

there is some asteroid that is supposed to pass between earth and moon in september though. i can find more info if you'd like, though i don't know too much about it myself.

Well to me an asteroid going between us and the moon is pretty scary but you dont seem concerned. What am i to think?

Originally posted by aware
Well to me an asteroid going between us and the moon is pretty scary but you dont seem concerned. What am i to think?

don't worry. only worry if they come within .1 lunar distances... that wouldn't be so hot. on march 27th, and asteroid came .6 lunar distances near earth. that's about 230,000 kilometers away.

neo.jpl.nasa.gov... is an excellent resource on these things.

What is your take on zero-point?
Does it exist? Is it a viable energy source?

nothing as a bad question! and i hope that cleared up any bad answers or anything that was previously left out. if you have anything more, please do ask!

Thanks friend!

Originally posted by aware
What is your take on zero-point?
Does it exist? Is it a viable energy source?

all i really know about it is that it is to take electromagnetic radiation and turn it into electric energy. that's basically all i know, so i can't take too much of a stance. i know it does exist in some form, though not in a very useful one yet. i think that once it's refined more and more research is done it can be a viable source of energy.

ask me more questions folks! that's why this thread is here... you know you've always wanted to see my atristic abilities as i draw a HR diagram in paint and then explain it. you know you've always wanted to know what population I and population II stars are, and where they can be found. you know you've always wanted to know what gamma ray bursters are. so start asking!