A Hyper-Velocity Impact In the Asteroid Belt? 114
astroengine writes "Astronomers have spotted something rather odd in the asteroid belt. It looks like a comet, but it's got a circular orbit, similar to an asteroid. Whether it's an asteroid or a comet, it has a long, comet-like tail, suggesting something is being vented into space. Some experts think it could be a very rare comet/asteroid hybrid being heated by the sun, but there's an even more exciting possibility: It could be the first ever observation of two asteroids colliding in the asteroid belt."
Its Chang (Score:1)
Spock: Gas! Gas Captain.
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First time I heard that line I thought he was complaining about the beans.
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(Wouldn't Spock be a fun character on Dexter turning into a homicidal vulcan psychopath? )
[Excerpt from police interview]
Spock:
The captain has been bossing me around for years, putting me in harms way, and worst of all, trying to evoke responses from my human side... It was only logical that I put an end to this madness.
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(Wouldn't Spock be a fun character on Dexter turning into a homicidal vulcan psychopath? )
Well, considering the new Spock is played by the guy who plays Sylar... not much of a stretch of the imagination at all.
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First time I heard that line I thought he was complaining about the beans.
Suit yourself, but somehow I enjoy thinking it's all about the heapin' helpin' of garbanzos Spock scoops up in the Enterprise cafeteria's salad bar. Vulcans just can't get enough of that Terran delicacy, smothered in Thousand Island dressing and a thick crust of black pepper. The first time Uhura and Sulu saw Spock doing that, they were like "whoa!", while Chekov was like "ay yay yay!".
Scotty grimaced, stole a quick gulp of whiskey
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Scotty grimaced, stole a quick gulp of whiskey from his flask
That would be whisky.
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Worst Slashfiction Ever
Who was driving? (Score:5, Funny)
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Regardless, you should feel safe on slashdot.
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does one want to admit to being the one that called out the women drivers of the world
Well, yes. My girlfriend and wife both agree that woman are terrible drivers, hence I do all the driving on any trip.
Re:Who was driving? (Score:5, Funny)
My girlfriend and wife both agree that woman are terrible drivers, hence I do all the driving on any trip.
That's funny, the last time I was with your wife and girlfriend they did all the driving, if ya know what I mean...... ;)
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Girlfiend (not a typo) doesn't like me referring to the other "her" as wife anymore either
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They pegged you?
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And your ass is still sore from their big rubber “drivers”? ;)
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"My girlfriend and wife both agree that woman are terrible drivers, hence I do all the driving on any trip."
I doubt you have both a girlfriend *AND* a wife seeing as you are Slashdot.
Either way, though, this is really just a ploy for them to nap while you drive all 12 hours of the trip. It's not agreeing, it's manipulation.
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I now look at all those guys with no woman and think the very same thing
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I doubt you have both a girlfriend *AND* a wife seeing as you are Slashdot.
Shouldn't that have been:
"I doubt you have both a girlfriend *OR* a wife seeing as you are Slashdot"?
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Anything goes in Second Life!
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It probably goes without saying that small accidents are more common than large ones. If women have more accidents in general, of course the number of small accidents is larger. You can only say "typically" like that because the numbers are so skewed. It has no bearing.
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That's because they drive slow, as well as erratically. Men drive fast to get to their destination, and occasionally fail to avoid the women who left early for their destination. :-)
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Quick disclaimer: I am a female, and I'm not trying to be judgmental or give off a feminist frame of mind.
Observing sometimes as a pedestrian, I think women are far less likely to yeild than men. It's my theory that this is in part because in the back of a woman's brain there's this precedent set by manners--people hold doors open for women to go first all the time. Also, women are more social, so when they're driving, their minds are far more likely to be thinking about people, where they are going, when
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Quick disclaimer: I am a female, and I'm not trying to be judgmental or give off a feminist frame of mind.
Observing sometimes as a pedestrian, I think women are far less likely to yeild than men. It's my theory that this is in part because in the back of a woman's brain there's this precedent set by manners--people hold doors open for women to go first all the time. Also, women are more social, so when they're driving, their minds are far more likely to be thinking about people, where they are going, when they will get home, all of that, and not so much thinking about actually driving.
Or they're just too busy yappin' on their damn cell phones.
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wow. that's an oblique way to blame the men again! ;)
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A collision between asteroids? Who wants to bet a woman was driving one of them?
According to this recent article, http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=pregnant-brain-as-racecar [scientificamerican.com] , they (at least the pregnant or postpartum) have a lot more on their minds than us simple menfolk.
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If the brain becomes better at something simply through hormonal changes, you would think there's something it becomes worse at at the same time. Apparently not for women who transcend these conventional stereotypes.
From the referenced article: "The hormones do have a downside. Some new mothers suffer from depression and in rare cases, even psychosis. Research at Tufts University and elsewhere suggests some potential animal models and endocrinological mechanisms for postpartum mental distress, broadly defined. It suggests that hormones are to blame: an acute pull-back, addict-like, from the rich concentrations of steroids that characterize pregnancy may play a role in the severity of postpartum reactions."
Add to that c
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Thankfully, the brain growth does not seem to be a zero-sum game. Meaning, that one does not gain in one area at the expense of another.
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Or, maybe... (Score:1)
The Alpha Centari battlestar is venting waste prior to invasion...
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You're close, this is exactly how the movie Armageddon starts
A comet roaring through the asteroid belt knocks loose a chunk the size of texas and sends it hurdling towards earth
Anybody got the phone number of Bruce Willis?
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Nonsense, we've been at peace with the Centari since 1947. They wouldn't dare invade now.
Asteroids boring? (Score:3, Funny)
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Also the force of gravity used to be much less extreme, even at close distances, so our asteroid field is actually much more sparse, otherwise it would quickly coalesce into a planet.
Monty ref (Score:1, Funny)
Their asteroid belt is dynamic and exciting, and filled with hungry, hungarian space eels in hovercrafts!
Re:Asteroids boring? (Score:4, Interesting)
It's also a lot sparser than a lot of people realize--enormously more empty than any representation you see on film, TV or video games. You could fly through it and never see an asteroid with the naked eye except as a point of light.
to heck with the star wars vernacular (Score:2)
can you possibly understand what grave implications this has in store for superman? the kryptonite is coming!
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-1 Unfunny Avatar reference.
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Here's a copy of the Star Wars Holiday Special. Art Carney ROCKS!
Missed Solution (Score:2)
They just should have slammed down the 'Hyperspace' button...sigh...
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You're right, plus the article doesn't make any sense. Asteroids just pass through one another.
If it's a result of a collision... (Score:2)
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Cant we send up John Travolta and Tom Cruise instead. There's still a chance Willis could make a decent movie.
Damn you spaceballs! (Score:1)
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Silly spaceballs and their ludacris speed foiling our scientists and their methods
They've gone bling!
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Please never spell "ludicrous" like that again.
Like a big pool table.... (Score:1)
So... did this collision send anything in our direction?
Lateral spray (Score:2, Interesting)
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The tail isn't a debris spray. It's a spray of sublimating ice that was recently exposed by an impact, but had previously been covered by less volatile material.
The Aliens are coming (Score:1)
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And fissionables to wash down the pizza.
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Well, Domino's does have a new crust.....
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Don't worry they only came to deliver Pizza.
FTFY
Even more exciting possibility! (Score:2)
It is well known that when rebels jump into hyperspace to escape the pursuing imperial battle cruisers, they might pop out in an asteroid belt. But most people think it is always possible to negotiate the craft around it and escape. Such false notions are strengthened by reports of more manuevrable craft deliberately entering asteroid belts to escape pursuit. But they don't always succeed and they
Hyper-Velocity (Score:1)
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It's exponentially more than extreme velocity.
Re:Hyper-Velocity (Score:5, Informative)
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Eg. one coming in from the left at 3/4c and one coming in from the left at 3/4c.
If they're both coming from the left at 0.75c, then their relative velocity will be zero....
Re:Hyper-Velocity (Score:4, Informative)
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>>However, if the objects' velocities are so fast that they would sum to more than the speed of light, then you need to use relativity.
Mr. Pedantic: You always have to use relativity, not just when combined vectors exceed c. Realistically, of course, you only have to start worrying about it when velocity starts exceeding some sizeable fraction of c (but still well before > c in Newtonian physics).
Imprecise calculations from the navicomputer? (Score:2)
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Wait a minute, that's not right. Navi *is* a computer.
"Hello, Navi."
A complete sentence? (Score:1, Flamebait)
Subby, what the fuck is so hard about forming a complete sentence? If you're going to resort to a lame ass question headline, could you at least make it a question that ASKS SOMETHING?
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Does it happen (Score:3, Funny)
Does it happen to look like a Big Boy statue? Maybe it's Dr. Evil coming back.
I for one welcome our gas venting overlords! (Score:1, Redundant)
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How is that more exciting? (Score:3, Insightful)
How is an asteroid collision more exciting than some kind of funky, very rare asteroid/comet hybrid?
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As a kid, which was more fun - a rock that looked different from other rocks, or smashing a big rock on an even bigger rock?
Adults are just big children. Collisions may not be more interesting, but they'll always be more exciting.
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Asteroid collisions can produce big delta-V effects.
Big lumps of rock fall towards sun.
Earth is in the way.
We live on Earth.
HTH.
J.
We need an asteroid in the face, folks. (Score:5, Insightful)
Seriously...not anything big but something Tunguska sized would do, especially over a moderately populated area.
We spend peanuts on detecting potential collisions that could be the cause of the next extinction event. Mark my words, there'll be more money spent on earthquake analysis for Haiti and other "sensational" causes than will be spent on detecting PHOs (potentially hazardous objects) in the next 10 years. I am not denigrating the need to spend money on Haiti - that's a tragedy for sure - but when you look at how reactive we are with public money (New Orleans, anyone? Despite warnings, no one saw this coming?) when a much smaller amount spent up-front would potentially save not just a lot more lives but a lot more money....if better building codes had been in force in Haiti - how many more people would have survived? How much money would have been saved?
I despair for our race. If we saw a dinosaur killer coming and had a program in place already we could probably survive it. Asteroids move slowly but are heavy and require a lot of time/energy to deflect so we would see them early and be able to react...comets move much, much faster but are lighter so presumably if we had the detection gear and a few mass drivers in space already, we could deal with it in a safe time frame.
So give us our Haiti or Katrina from space, please. Make it hurt but not too much - just enough to wake up the people handing out government cash.
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Reference:
http://www.spaceref.com/news/viewsr.html?pid=9866 [spaceref.com]
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Priorities are a function of Probabilities (Score:5, Informative)
Scenario 1: Asteroid strike. I defer to NASA JPL [nasa.gov], the Tunguska event (100-meter class = ~ 15 mil tons TNT) asteroid occurs once or twice / 1000 years. A 1000-meter class is 1 in 15 million years. An 8000-meter class (dinosaur killer) is 1 in 50-100 million years.
Scenario 2: Earthquake. San Francisco [usgs.gov] has an annual forecast of earthquake probabilities, and they predict a 68% probability of a 6.7 Magnitude or greater in the next 30 years. Wikipedia [wikipedia.org] gives a probability scale for earthquakes, where a Magnitude 7 (similar to what struke Haiti) occurs 18 / year. A single 6.7 earthquake (P = 120/year) is equivalent to 16 kilotons of energy, or about 1 Tungaska event (P = 0.004/year).
Given the disparity in the probability of asteroid strikes (on populated areas, no less) vs earthquakes, it should be no surprise that the world governments believe money is better spent on earthquake prediction and evacuation relief, not on asteroid strike detection. The "bang for the buck" is clearly higher in earthquake spending.
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From an open letter to congress, here:
http://www.spaceref.com/news/viewsr.html?pid=9866 [spaceref.com]
"We cannot rely on statistics alone to protect us from catastrophe; such a strategy is like refusing to buy fire insurance because blazes are infrequent. Our country simply cannot afford to wait for the first modern occurrence of a devastating NEO impact before taking steps to adequately address this threat. We may not have the luxury of a second chance, for time is not necessarily on our side. If we do not act now, and w
Re:Priorities are a function of Probabilities (Score:4, Insightful)
Given the disparity in the probability of asteroid strikes (on populated areas, no less) vs earthquakes, it should be no surprise that the world governments believe money is better spent on earthquake prediction and evacuation relief, not on asteroid strike detection. The "bang for the buck" is clearly higher in earthquake spending.
1. An earthquake affects a relatively small population.
2. A single dinosaur killer could wipe out humanity.
3. Probability for all these events approaches 1 as time goes on.
In light of the above your "bang for buck" argument is silly. It's like counting the pennies while sitting on the railroad track with your back turned to a huge locomotive with blaring sirens that's about to hit you at 100km/hr and arguing that it costs too much to turn around and look at how close it is, never mind get off your ass and out of the way of the train.
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And what exactly do you suppose we puny humans can do about that "huge locomotive with blaring sirens that's about to hit [us]"? We can neither deflect the "locomotive" (your "dinosaur killer"), nor can we get out of the way (move the whole planet).
Not like there's anything we can do about preventing earthquakes either.
But even if we had the ability, do we have the wherewithal to actually do anything about either asteroids or earthquakes? We're demonstrating how good we are about ignoring the future and
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And what exactly do you suppose we puny humans can do about that "huge locomotive with blaring sirens that's about to hit [us]"? We can neither deflect the "locomotive" (your "dinosaur killer"), nor can we get out of the way (move the whole planet).
We can't deflect it in the stupid way portrayed in movies, but we may well be able to change it's trajectory. How do we know? Have we spent any significant time or resources trying to find a way? Your defeatist attitude is awful, and we'd never have survived as
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especially over a moderately populated area.
I believe it's traditional for this kind of thing to land on Phoenix, AZ.
Probably not (Score:5, Funny)
Everyone knows the asteroids pass right through each other. It's either been shot or it has collided with a ship.
Honestly, what kind of education are scientists getting these days?
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Those who moderated the parent "Insightful" should be meta-moderated as either "Clueless" or "Humorless".
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The mods sometimes do mod a good joke "Informative" or "Insightful" to add more fun to it
It's true. It's unfortunate when people don't "get" satirical moderation.
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Think about that for a minute, and you'll realize why it hasn't been done.
You'd fly for a long, long time in mostly empty space. When you found an asteroid, most of them would be too large for any conceivable weapon to significantly affect, and the smaller ones wouldn't just break in half, they'd break into hundreds or thousands of smaller chunks, traveling in all directions at high speeds. And those saucers? You'd never even see them, because they'd engage you at a range of several light seconds with beam
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> Real physics is cool, but it doesn't often make for good arcade games.
He wrote *physics* based, not *astronomy* based.
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> Real physics is cool, but it doesn't often make for good arcade games.
He wrote *physics* based, not *astronomy* based.
And, just to clarify, I'll settle for unreal game "physics" - I just want to see asteroids bouncing off each other instead of passing through.
Modelling light-speed propagation, quantum mechanics and/or quantum gravitation are strictly in the nice-to-have basket.
Two asteroids colliding (Score:2, Informative)
A video of it happening! (Score:2)
Someone achieved to capture it on video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cZfsnA7dAHI [youtube.com]
Unbelievable. I wonder what that thing in the middle is...
Last stop! (Score:1)
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Maybe they've got some sort of exchange program running?
Why there's a difference. (Score:5, Informative)
There's a reason you don't normally see icy bodies in circular orbits in the asteroid belt: they'd be blown clean of the ice within a fairly short period of time, astronomically speaking. that's what the tail consists of, dust embedded in the ice being released as the ice sublimes. Which means that the ice here has to have been exposed fairly recently.