Comet c2013 On A Possible Collision Course With Mars in 2014 - Polidicks

Maybe it's actually a transport vessel from the first ancestral race...

Pinecleandog's Thesis on the Standard Orbital Model and How it is Wrong. Abstract: endless possibilities u wot

Oh whatever if you're going to be stubborn I'm not going to bother discussing it. Go skip on down back to communist Russia.

[QUOTE=pinecleandog;39747256]Oh whatever if you're going to be stubborn I'm not going to bother discussing it. Go skip on down back to communist Russia.[/QUOTE] Having a basic understanding of physics isn't being stubborn.

[QUOTE=pinecleandog;39747256]Oh whatever if you're going to be stubborn I'm not going to bother discussing it. Go skip on down back to communist Russia.[/QUOTE] oh we are stubborn, okay.

[QUOTE=CaF;39747278]oh we are stubborn, okay.[/QUOTE] Not directed at you.

[QUOTE=pinecleandog;39747256]Oh whatever if you're going to be stubborn I'm not going to bother discussing it. Go skip on down back to communist Russia.[/QUOTE] Sorry Bill Nye, do continue telling us how science is wrong.

Hopefully it sets off the terraforming process.

[QUOTE=Pierrewithahat;39746911]If this thing hits with enough force it could actually release a lot of CO2 and water locked in the ground. Hell it's one of the big ideas for terraforming mars anyway, if this starts the process we'd be as well carrying it on.[/QUOTE] No. Not really.

[QUOTE=Legend286;39747306]Sorry Bill Nye, do continue telling us how science is wrong.[/QUOTE] Why can't it be possible for debris to come Earth then? So far nobody has done anything to explain why not, other than just telling me that I'm wrong.

[QUOTE=pinecleandog;39747256]Oh whatever if you're going to be stubborn I'm not going to bother discussing it. Go skip on down back to communist Russia.[/QUOTE] What debris is supposed to be hitting us exactly? Pieces of Mars launched into space from the impact with enough force to move anywhere near Earth? Fragments of the comet bouncing miraculously from Mars to Earth? Something else? For all of these whatever debris must be ejected at at least 5km/s, which is very much impossible.

[QUOTE=pinecleandog;39747343]Why can't it be possible for debris to come Earth then? So far nobody has done anything to explain why not, other than just telling me that I'm wrong.[/QUOTE] It is possible for debris from Mars to hit Earth, but most probably not from this tiny rock. First of all, probably won't even hit Mars, second, it's estimated to be everything from 8-50 km in diameter, while huge, I don't know if it'll manage to hit Mars with such a speed that it will fling rocks in such high velocities that they'll end up affecting Earth.

[QUOTE=pinecleandog;39747343]Why can't it be possible for debris to come Earth then? So far nobody has done anything to explain why not, other than just telling me that I'm wrong.[/QUOTE] It simply isn't big enough. Sure its theoretically possible if it was hit with something bigger, I mean we have been hit by mars debris before.

Okay, thank you for elaborating that for me. I obviously don't have a great understanding in any type of physics because I've picked a completely different career... But yeah, now it makes sense why you guys don't think it's possible.

[QUOTE=pinecleandog;39747343]Why can't it be possible for debris to come Earth then? So far nobody has done anything to explain why not, other than just telling me that I'm wrong.[/QUOTE] For debris to hit earth (assuming that it hit mars and did fragment) the debris cloud would have to have velocities that are able to escape Mars's gravitational field. Then comes the issue of that the some of the debris would have to somehow fly off in either a direction towards earth(if the comet hits on a side of Mars facing the earth at the time) and not be interrupted in flight by other debris or gravity or fly off in a direction in which its orbital path would set it in collision with earth. However, note that any debris coming off of this impact, with enough velocity to escape Mars's gravity well, is most likely so small that it would just join the millions of other pieces of space debris and dust that impact the earth every day. Remember, space is big, the earth's atmosphere is big and aerodynamic heating is a bitch.

[QUOTE=PHrag;39747154]Comet hits Mars, derails it so Mars hits Earth. This is how space stuff works, right?[/QUOTE] It's just like cosmic billiards right?

[QUOTE=Reviized;39747434]For debris to hit earth (assuming that it hit mars and did fragment) the debris cloud would have to have velocities that are able to escape Mars's gravitational field. Then comes the issue of that the some of the debris would have to somehow fly off in either a direction towards earth(if the comet hits on a side of Mars facing the earth at the time) and not be interrupted in flight by other debris or gravity or fly off in a direction in which its orbital path would set it in collision with earth. However, note that any debris coming off of this impact, with enough velocity to escape Mars's gravity well, is most likely so small that it would just join the millions of other pieces of space debris and dust that impact the earth every day. Remember, space is big, the earth's atmosphere is big and aerodynamic heating is a bitch.[/QUOTE] Not to mention it would take a hundred million years, since that is when the average mars meteor has been dated.

[QUOTE=Bradyns;39746634]It still amazes me to think that we can determine the trajectories of tiny rocks in space...[/QUOTE] Laplace's demon at work

Despite the chance of it even hitting mars, is it realistic to think that we could get footage of its impact?

[QUOTE=Anax;39747607]Despite the chance of it even hitting mars, is it realistic to think that we could get footage of its impact?[/QUOTE] If it does hit we could possibly get footage of it either from one of the orbiting crafts we have there (most likely) or some sort of footage from a rover. Depends on where it hits.

We got some spectacular footage of past Jupiter impacts so here is hoping!

Maybe that's what it needs to put life back on it? It would be awesome to actually see a "regeneration" process going on after that comet hit it.

[QUOTE=Pierrewithahat;39746911]If this thing hits with enough force it could actually release a lot of CO2 and water locked in the ground. Hell it's one of the big ideas for terraforming mars anyway, if this starts the process we'd be as well carrying it on.[/QUOTE] This is exactly what I was thinking (well, if it hit one of the ice-caps at least). An absolutely absurd amount of water would flood out onto the surface of the planet and CO2 thrown into the air (which the solar wind would take hundreds of thousands to millions of years to strip away again, so we'd have time to utilise the new atmosphere). And, on top of that, the level of depth which matter would be thrown up from (well, that which wasn't immediately vapourised in the blast) if studied would probably tell us a WHOLE host about the geological past of Mars. Assuming this is a giant ball of carbon (it's average atomic mass is probably HIGHER than that of carbon actually - much higher - but just on that assumption...), at 50km in diameter, with a relative speed to Mars of 56 km per second, the transfer of momentum to Mars in that collision (assuming it's a completely elastic collision) would be enough to alter Mars' velocity by about 1.3 cm/s (that might not seem like an awful lot, but any impact with any astronomical body departing enough momentum to even NOTICEABLY alter the velocity of said astronomical body is pretty fucking insane). [editline]1st March 2013[/editline] Actually, I take that back. With the yield given in the article of 2×10^10 megatons (2x10^13 kilotons, or 20000000000000 kilotons for you to copy and paste it) the impact would turn half of Mars into a fucking ocean of magma, [url]http://nuclearsecrecy.com/nukemap/[/url] There wouldn't be any carbon dioxide or water LEFT. It'd all be atomised in the explosion.

Is an ocean of magma useful? Like maybe a foundry or something?

[QUOTE=Krinkels;39748347]Is an ocean of magma useful? Like maybe a foundry or something?[/QUOTE] Give me a fucking magma boat first so I can go fishing.

[QUOTE=pinecleandog;39746998]The thing is, if it does hit Mars it Could possibly affect Earth.[/QUOTE] The martians will abandon mars before it hits and they will claim earth as their new home. We are all doomed, repent!

[QUOTE=Pierrewithahat;39746911]If this thing hits with enough force it could actually release a lot of CO2 and water locked in the ground. Hell it's one of the big ideas for terraforming mars anyway, if this starts the process we'd be as well carrying it on.[/QUOTE] Terraforming mars is a lost cause, the entire reason mars has such a thin atmosphere is because it's magnetic field died, and the atmosphere was stripped away by the sun.

[QUOTE=zombini;39748675]Terraforming mars is a lost cause, the entire reason mars has such a thin atmosphere is because it's magnetic field died, and the atmosphere was stripped away by the sun.[/QUOTE] We can rebuild it... we have the technology.

So what are the chances that those prothean ruins will be uncovered in the blast? and with a blast that sized, we're likely to lose every rover on the planet.

Wouldn't it hitting being a good thing? Not only would we be able to see for ourselves in massive detail an impact that would be cataclysmic to us, but we could also send new probes there that could sample the fresh new material.