Stellar Blast Boils Away Some of a Planet's Atmosphere 34
The Bad Astronomer writes "Using a combination of Hubble and Swift observations, astronomers have apparently witnessed some of a planet's atmosphere being peeled away by a powerful stellar blast. HD 189733b orbits its star just 4 million km from the surface, and a few hours after Swift detected a big X-ray flare from the star, Hubble data revealed a big jump in hydrogen absorption as the planet transited the star. This indicates the planet's atmosphere was blasted off by the flare to the tune of a thousand tons of hydrogen per second. The planet is so hot it probably already loses a substantial amount of air to space all the time, but this spike is the first time a change in an exoplanet's atmosphere has been detected."
Re:It could happen here (Score:5, Insightful)
I've heard theories that one of the Earth's mass extinction events may have been caused by a glancing blow from a GRB. The side facing away from the GRB would be mostly fine in the short term, but the boiling of the oceans on the other side would have much longer term implications for the entire planet.
Re:4 mil km (Score:4, Insightful)
I wonder if I'd ever be able to afford such a restaurant. Wait, I just found a penny.