Blowing up Comets 101

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125gJoe

125gJoe

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"In addition to the flyby spacecraft, at least 30 telescopes around the world, including Spitzer, Hubble and the Chandra X-ray Observatory, will be watching the dramatic impact. By analyzing the material blown out of the interior of the comet, this global network of telescopes will assemble a list of the raw ingredients that went into making the planets in our solar system."

On the same website, they say fragments may hit Mars. The explosion is supposed to take place on the Fourth of July.

Link: http://deepimpact.jpl.nasa.gov/
 
nursie

nursie

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When I saw the title...I thought maybe you were blowing up goldfish....

I'm unclear: is someone intentionally blowing this up or is this an expected collision that is going to take place?
 
125gJoe

125gJoe

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nursie said:
When I saw the title...I thought maybe you were blowing up goldfish....

I'm unclear: is someone intentionally blowing this up or is this an expected collision that is going to take place?
Click to expand...
It's all true.

Not the goldfish part! :D

Get out your best fireworks on the 4th, NASA will too.... !

---------

Why didn't the people get to vote on blowing up space things or not??
 
Dangerdoll

Dangerdoll

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125gJoe said:
On the same website, they say fragments may hit Mars. The explosion is supposed to take place on the Fourth of July.

Link: http://deepimpact.jpl.nasa.gov/
Click to expand...
wow.... how appropriate!! But like nursie said, is someone intentionally blowing this up or is this an expected collision that is going to take place? It sounds pretty interesting...
 
Raskolnikov

Raskolnikov

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They're going to intentionally create a small crater in the surface of a comet by hurling a small craft at it from a larger craft flying towards the comet. The impact will be filmed from both craft (as well as other telescopes) in order to learn more about the comet.

You won't see anything without the aid of a telescope, and even then it's not going to be anything as dramatic as blowing up a comet.
 
125gJoe

125gJoe

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Jul 6, 2002
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Ooops....

I could have sworn I saw the word 'explosives' when I read through the site.

Guess not..

"Q: Are you using explosives to make the crater in Comet Tempel 1?

There is no bomb nor explosives on our spacecraft. When the impactor hits the comet, it forms the crater simply from the transfer of kinetic energy. For example, 2 cars traveling very slowly only get crunched a little when they hit, but two cars traveling very fast can get demolished upon impact. Same thing with Deep Impact's impactor and the comet, they are both traveling very fast (faster than cars, faster than bullets) so the crunch they make is enough to carve out a good-sized crater on the comet without using explosives."
 
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