Questions tagged [asteroids]
For questions about rock particles or large rocky bodies in space, typically in orbit around a star. Contrast with "meteors", space rocks falling to planetary surfaces. Whereas asteroids are objects to be encountered during space travel, meteors are a space weather phenomenon observed on planets.
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Can I spin 3753 Cruithne and keep it spinning?
I am planning to build a habitat with close to Earth gravity on asteroid 3753 Cruithne. I would dig a circular tunnel (or series of parallel tunnels) deep under the surface, with a radius of 4 ...
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Using asteroids for water
I have a planet that has no natural water bodies or sources. Is it feasible (assuming technology along the lines of the Earth Engines from "The Wandering Earth") to take asteroids from a ...
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What are the repercussions of two asteroids in the asteroid belt colliding?
As the title states, what would happen if two asteroids in the asteroid belt were to collide? Specifically, two the size of 45 Eugina impacting with each other. In my story, I am thinking about having ...
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Would a rogue planet experience more asteroid collisions?
I'm working on a novel where the characters inhabit a rogue planet. Would that planet get hit by more asteroids due to the fact that it isn't orbiting a star? I have a feeling that the distance is ...
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What would be the size of the outer asteroid belt in this system?
I am following the Artifexia-like system building with the calculator. Per the calculator, my system looks like this:
I am having trouble calculating the inner and outer limits of the second asteroid ...
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433 Eros hits the Moon. How much rock hits the Earth?
A la this image I made.
The "how" (nuclear pulse drive "adjusting" Eros's orbit at its aphelion) and "why" (uber-sized Rods from God) isn't particularly relevant — all ...
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amount of mass needed to speed up Venus rotation
So, returning again to the subject of terraforming Venus, what if these terraformers collide an asteroid with the planet? This meteor hits Venus at an angle, and thus speeds up its rotation to 24 ...
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What is the most massive naturally occurring object that could support a void in its center?
Remember Journey to the Center of the Earth? The premise is that there's some kind of cave in the center of the Earth, which has an ecosystem inside it. Well, of course you can't do such a silly ...
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Chances for a Large Asteroid Hitting Mars
Since Mars is much closer to the asteroid belt, is it also more likely an asteroid large enough for planetary devastation (~1 kilometer) will strike it? I'm especially wondering how such a possibility ...
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Is it possible to have an Illuminated Standard temperature and pressure pocket inside of a comet? [closed]
The title is fairly self explanatory. A pocket inside a comet, able to have liquid water and similar pressures to earth. I want a realistic and science based way to achieve this.
requirements:
Must ...
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Coilguns as spaceship thrusters second attempt
This is a second attempt for this question, the first time i put in too many different things that ended up derailing the question.
I'm in the early stages of designing a scifi game and want to use as ...
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Bunkers to save humanity? [closed]
lets say governments have secretly known about this in advance and have been building these bunkers in secret, including underground farming using artificial light and recycled water
I just want to ...
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Ferrovolcanism on an asteroid caused by rotating induction heating
I found out about Ferrovolcanism on asteroids and its a pretty neat idea for a space sci fi setting. Moreover, I have come up with a hypothetical way that an asteroid could be heated by induction ...
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Using coilguns or VASIMR as thrusters in a game
i'm in the early stages of designing a scifi game and want to use as little handwavium as possible (without ruining the fun). The first part of the game takes place in the asteroid belt and includes ...
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What Would Be The Consequences of An Asteroid Literally Falling Onto An Ice Sheet?
On this alternate Last Glacial Maximum Earth powerful psychics bring an asteroid into near earth orbit and deorbit it using entirely laser ablation. Bringing it carefully down onto the Laurentide Ice ...
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Could the extraction of rare earth elements (REE) be more efficient on asteroids as opposed to on earth?
Could we mine or extract REEs in asteroids more easily than on earth? The following conditions apply:
Ease of extraction does not include getting to the asteroid or transferring materials back to ...
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What would an Earth-like planet with a mostly stable ring be like? [closed]
I recently watched a video talking about what would happen if our moon was on a collision course with the Earth and they described it being ripped apart by Earth's gravity. This made me want to re-...
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Ore/mineral hotspots in planetary rings
In my setting, there is a small, rocky ring system surrounding an earth-like habitable planet. This ring was formed relatively recently (approx. 50 million years ago) from a small moon with a Moon-...
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A continent sized land formation on a water planet with impassable mountains all around the edges and a salty sea in the middle
In order for the plot and character development I have planned to work the people need to be living on an island continent about 200,000km (England/New Zealand/Japan size, but oval/round shaped) with ...
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For my alternate earth, what could cause the position of the axis to change?
Long ago, when the dinosaurs roamed the world, something happened....
In this alternate universe, something happens that shifts the axis of the Earth from its original position during the Mesozoic Era ...
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Orbital Towers & Tethered Asteroids
In my story I have an orbital tower or space elevator on a world the size of Earth. Yes, it goes up to geosync orbit. The tower has a tethered asteroid -- how big can it be without exerting ...
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Effects in space on a human standing to the side of the muzzle of a huge rail gun when fired
The setting.
Space, the inner asteroid belt. An LNCHR ship is anchored to an asteroid without atmosphere.
A LNCHR ship is a ship with two main facilities:
A space crane to raise the slugs filled with ...
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Is this asteroid realistic?
I would like to know if the following properties of this asteroid are realistic without conflicting with each other.
situated in the inner part of the asteroid belt in the Solar System
S-type ...
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Surface of interstellar convoy's asteroid shield
A voyage of several ships at 0.2c needs raw materials and protection from impacts with interstellar dust. For these purposes, they installed enormous thrusters on the circumference of a 10-km-diameter ...
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Where can lithium be found in the Solar System?
My question is pretty straightforward, beside earth, what celestial bodies could hold exploitable quantities of lithium-7 and lithium-6?
I understand that lithium is a scarce element in our universe. ...
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Climate after the Ragnarok IMPACT
I am curious (with reasons) about what will happen after an asteroid (called Valhalla 2! Valhalla 1 had collided with the Moon!) collides with Earth.
Initially, Valhalla 2 is a major fragment that ...
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Could an asteroid impact permanently reduce water content on a planet?
I am building a world that used to be almost entirely covered in water but was struck by a large metallic asteroid (roughly the same mass as the one that killed off the dinosaurs) which boiled off ...
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Is “asteroid rain” on the Moon a feasible concept?
In my story, a group of creatures lives on the Moon. I know that microlith striking the Moon is fairly common, to the point that EVA suits are built to compensate for it, but I was planning to have a “...
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Can nuclear intercontinental missiles be launched into space to destroy asteroids menacing Earth?
Wikipedia states that intercontinental ballistic missiles can fly a minimum of 5500 kilometers, can we shoot these missiles into space to reach beyond the thermosphere and explode on contact with an ...
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Could asteroids getting shredded in low Earth orbit by an alien probe result in Kessler syndrome capable of preventing ICBMs from functioning?
Now, one good answer to "could deliberately induced Kessler Syndrome stop ICBMs?" is that the amount of mass required for such a thing is in the realm of ~2.5 trillion kilograms of matter, ...
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Would it be feasible to make a planet out of asteroids?
Would it be feasible to make a planet out of asteroids taken from the solar system? It can only be made from objects less than 3 kilometers in radius inside the solar system. The way i'm thinking of ...
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Can an asteroid go through the sun?
I'm looking into a story where the Earth is hit by an asteroid going very fast. This must be a complete surprise and I want to go a mile further than just giving the entirely valid solution of it ...
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Asteroid/comet deflection: Will a stream of nukes work?
Imagine you want to change the course of an asteroid quickly. You have huge resources at your disposal. What is the best way to move an asteroid quickly? Consider different compositions, chiefly solid ...
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Could the canopy of a Dyson Tree actually work?
Piggybacking on Q: What is required to make a Dyson Tree a feasible space habitat?
So I recently came across the concept of the Dyson Tree (I’d already heard of the Dyson Sphere). For those who don’t ...
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Delivery of minerals to Earth from the asteroids by artificial meteorite or solid metal glider
Scenario
Mining of asteroids is a successful venture in the future. However much of the resulting mineral yield is required on Earth and the problem is delivery. Carrying thousands or millions of tons ...
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Would an asteroid colliding with a terrestrial planet result in the creation of extensive caves nearby the crater?
I just did some research on the Chicxulub crater in the Yucatán Peninsula in Mexico, which is the crater from the asteroid responsible for the extinction of the dinosaurs.
Yucatán itself does have ...
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Could a planet's tidal forces break an asteroid passing very close to it?
I want a certain asteroid of my system to break into pieces as it approaches a planet, having one fragment impact the planet itself, another fragment slingshot and impact the planet's moon and the ...
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Asteroid mining and Newton's 3rd law
Imagine mankind has established mining facilities on NEOs
Some of them send raw ore directly to other processing stations in space, others refine on site.
All of them use a system based on cargo '...
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Why put a big rock into orbit around Ceres? [closed]
Ceres is the largest asteroid in the belt, and in my world building, is a booming mining hub, supplying water-ice and cheap minerals to other destinations in the solar system.
For gameplay purposes it ...
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Is the composition of the major asteroid belt bodies different enough to make trade between colonies worthwhile?
For my question I'm assuming that we're talking about colonies on the very biggest bodies that are 100s of kms in size. I'm assuming that by this point humans have become cyborgified/roboticized ...
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Supplies sat in space for five years, are they still usable?
A travelling space fleet found an old militarized asteroid, with weaponry, space suits, munitions, and food which had been sitting there for 5 years. Is it still usable and safe?
Guns- coilguns, ...
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Would it be possible for hunter gatherers to accidentally colonize an exoplanet, from an asteroid knocking a rock containing a cave into space?
I was thinking of a situation, in which a band of hunter gatherers goes into a cave, and while they are in the cave an asteroid crashes into the Earth, causing the rock that the cave is in to be ...
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How long would it take for water vapor from an ocean asteroid impact to rain back down?
In my story a consortium of megacorporations spot a new comet 26km wide entering the inner solar system. Earth is in dire need of water because of an already worsening climate change disaster (think ...
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Plausible Reason for Asteroids Being Close Together
I know that in real life, asteroids tend to be hundreds of thousands of kilometres apart.
In fiction, asteroids are often very close together, maybe a few hundred metres. Obviously this is much more ...
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How far would an antimatter asteroid made inside our solar system? [closed]
Imagine right now an antimatter asteroid the size of Hawaii of extraterrestrial origin enters our solar system and is on a collision course with one of the inner planet, Mercury at a fantastic speed ...
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3 Asteroids hit the planet - What happens next? [closed]
3 Large Asteroids, each the rough size of London, UK, in diameter. The Asteroids are rocky, with bits of water and ice in them as well.
They impact the Earth, at 57km/s, in South America, East Africa, ...
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What if a meteorite hit Roswell, NM in 1947? [closed]
I have always been interested in alternate histories that dramatically affect the course, duration, or intensity of 20th century spacefaring. One of the issues that has precluded large-scale ...
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Asteroid mining: Good for the environment?
What if there was a binding global resolution passed tomorrow mandating that all countries gradually close down their terrestrial resource extraction sites and instead source from asteroid mines? ...
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Logistics of how to mine an asteroid [duplicate]
How would one go about mining an asteroid in a broad sense?
This question not in the mining itself, but location of the mining.
Say you have located an asteroid in that would like to mine. Which ...
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What would be the effect(s) of high-speed plasma impacting a planet?
As a follow-up to this question, what would be the effect(s) of a high-speed of super-heated plasma entering and impacting on a planet?
The planet is about the size of 1.2x Earth(s), with a similar ...
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