Giant Asteroid hitting the Sun

[brights]

What happens when an Asteroid the size of Neptune hits the Sun?

Would the Sun lose it's brightness for a period?
Would the Sun burst out a fury of solar flares scorching men on Earth?

[ashpwner]

id think the rock wouldent either make it that close or once it hit it it would be disolved into the magma in the suns flare

[przyk]

What happens when an Asteroid the size of Neptune hits the Sun?

The impact would send a dust cloud up into the solar atmosphere leading to a widespread reduction in temperatures. Any dinosaur communities on the solar surface would face extinction.

[temur]

Hopefully the Sun will survive.

[Communist Hamster]

What happens when an Asteroid the size of Neptune hits the Sun?

Would the Sun lose it's brightness for a period?
Would the Sun burst out a fury of solar flares scorching men on Earth?

There are no asteroids the size of Neptune. A rocky object that big would have a very noticeable gravity well.

But, let's just say there is one out there, a rogue planet perhaps from another planetary system. It would quite probably melt before it hits the Sun, and then the large ball of lava would plummet into the Suns atmosphere and never be seen again. There might be interesting effects to the solar weather but nothing that would affect Earth, afaik. Thew sun is just too huge to receive any damaging effects from something puny like a Neptune sized asteroid.
I am not an astrophysicist...yet

[BenTheMan]

I think that the bigger thing to worry about is what happens if an asteroid the size of Neptune flies past Earth. That would SERIOUSLY fuck us up---and there would be absolutely nothing we could do about it.

Even worse, we wouldn't be able to figure out how it would effect us, I think. Many body systems are notoriously difficult to model.

[Pandaemoni]

An asteroid the size of Neptune would still be only about 0.0000004% the volume of the Sun, assuming both were spherical. The solar system can be pretty accurately described as "a medium sized yellow star surrounded by some insignificant debris."

It would be like a mosquito colliding with a bug zapper....devastating from the mosquitos perspective, but the zapper will only barely be affected.

[Wisdom_Seeker]

We have a huge screen that blocks any asteroid that big that is going to impact Earth, is called Jupiter, the asteroid has to be somewhat small to get pass Jupiter, like the one that made the Dinosaurs go doo-doo, that was a small one.

[EmptyForceOfChi]

What happens when an Asteroid the size of Neptune hits the Sun?

Would the Sun lose it's brightness for a period?
Would the Sun burst out a fury of solar flares scorching men on Earth?

i dont think that an asteroid of that size could exist, it would class as a planet i think due to its gracity. also it would already be in an orbital pattern of its own,


peace.

[Read-Only]

We have a huge screen that blocks any asteroid that big that is going to impact Earth, is called Jupiter, the asteroid has to be somewhat small to get pass Jupiter, like the one that made the Dinosaurs go doo-doo, that was a small one.

There are two major problems with assuming that would protect us from anything. First, you are assuming that the asteroid would approach directly in line with the plane of Jupiter's orbit. Quite likely , considering where the asteroid belt is, but FAR from being certain.

And the other is Jupiter would have to be at precisely the right position in it's orbit - and THAT is highly, highly unlikely.

[Communist Hamster]

I think that the bigger thing to worry about is what happens if an asteroid the size of Neptune flies past Earth. That would SERIOUSLY fuck us up---and there would be absolutely nothing we could do about it.

Even worse, we wouldn't be able to figure out how it would effect us, I think. Many body systems are notoriously difficult to model.

Well, assuming the asteroid comes in from either the "top" or the "bottom" of the plane of the solar system.

[BenTheMan]

Well, assuming the asteroid comes in from either the "top" or the "bottom" of the plane of the solar system.

Yes, of course

[Athelwulf]

What happens when an Asteroid the size of Neptune hits the Sun?

We don't know for sure. We haven't observed such a phenomenon yet. We may have some pretty damn good educated guesses, however.

Would the Sun lose it's brightness for a period?

Maybe not.

Would the Sun burst out a fury of solar flares scorching men on Earth?

What I wonder is, if it does, will the women be safe?

The impact would send a dust cloud up into the solar atmosphere leading to a widespread reduction in temperatures. Any dinosaur communities on the solar surface would face extinction.

That made me laugh.

We have a huge screen that blocks any asteroid that big that is going to impact Earth, is called Jupiter, the asteroid has to be somewhat small to get pass Jupiter, like the one that made the Dinosaurs go doo-doo, that was a small one.

Putting aside the fact that was a run-on sentence — What if Jupiter is on the other side of the solar system twiddling its thumbs or playing with itself when this asteroid of Neptunian proportions comes through?

[orcot]

the gravitationel well would disrupt many asteroids pulling them inwards, the time that it would take for it to impact the sun would proberly give something of a 10% change of hitting (also read distabalising) mars a 25% change of hitting earth a 40% change of hitting Venus and a 60% change of hitting mercurius.
The impact would depend on the composition of the asteroid a stone asteroid would proberly be distroyed on impact but the heavy metals would float at the surface disturbing the solar magnetic field causing massive solar flares and changing the overal color for some time, a lighter version with a lot of hydrogen helium and lithium would have a bigger bang but would relativly stay for a shorter period of time the hydrogen wold mix nicly and the heaviers would relativly fuse fast or sink... PS I've looked none of this up so tis is purely gueswork

[Read-Only]

the gravitationel well would disrupt many asteroids pulling them inwards, the time that it would take for it to impact the sun would proberly give something of a 10% change of hitting (also read distabalising) mars a 25% change of hitting earth a 40% change of hitting Venus and a 60% change of hitting mercurius.
The impact would depend on the composition of the asteroid a stone asteroid would proberly be distroyed on impact but the heavy metals would float at the surface disturbing the solar magnetic field causing massive solar flares and changing the overal color for some time, a lighter version with a lot of hydrogen helium and lithium would have a bigger bang but would relativly stay for a shorter period of time the hydrogen wold mix nicly and the heaviers would relativly fuse fast or sink... PS I've looked none of this up so tis is purely gueswork

Yes, pure guesswork indeed! There's no way you could actually calculate such possibilities of such a body striking any of those planets, especially when it's path is totally unknown and the position of the planets in their huge orbits is more likely to cause a total miss.

Also, any heavy elements contained in the asteroid would immediately start sinking toward the center (where all the other heavier elements currently are) and would spent NO time lingering about on the surface.

[Wisdom_Seeker]

There are two major problems with assuming that would protect us from anything. First, you are assuming that the asteroid would approach directly in line with the plane of Jupiter's orbit. Quite likely , considering where the asteroid belt is, but FAR from being certain.

And the other is Jupiter would have to be at precisely the right position in it's orbit - and THAT is highly, highly unlikely.

Yeap, you´re right, I made this assumtion because I saw a documentary on the Discovery Channel; which says that Jupiter gets a LOT of asteroid hits, that if it wasn´t for Jupiter, they would have hit the Earth. But those are just probabilities.

[Wisdom_Seeker]

Look at this:

"The close similarity to Jupiter has a special significance to astronomers. One of the things that made life on Earth possible in the first place was the looming presence of our sun's fifth planet, whose massive gravity vacuumed up a lot of incoming comets and asteroids, keeping the small inner worlds relatively safe in the shooting gallery that was the early solar system. The clear lane Jupiter created became a sort of orbital sweet spot, where temperatures could remain moderate and volatile substances such as water could persist, giving life a chance to arise."

http://www.time.com/time/magazine/ar...263001,00.html

It turns out I wasn´t that far off base after all, but maybe I am, I just don´t know anymore. (:

[Read-Only]

Look at this:

"The close similarity to Jupiter has a special significance to astronomers. One of the things that made life on Earth possible in the first place was the looming presence of our sun's fifth planet, whose massive gravity vacuumed up a lot of incoming comets and asteroids, keeping the small inner worlds relatively safe in the shooting gallery that was the early solar system. The clear lane Jupiter created became a sort of orbital sweet spot, where temperatures could remain moderate and volatile substances such as water could persist, giving life a chance to arise."

http://www.time.com/time/magazine/ar...263001,00.html

It turns out I wasn´t that far off base after all, but maybe I am, I just don´t know anymore. (:

Yes, there IS truth in that. But you have only to look at the surface of our Moon to see how much stuff got through anyway. (And again, even the Moon caught all those collisions only when it was in the right place at the right time.)

[Balerion]

Speaking of which...has anyone factored the Moon into this big asteroid that might be hitting us in 2036, or whatever? Could it hit the Moon, or are the chances of that happening so small that it isn't even worth thinking about?

[Read-Only]

Speaking of which...has anyone factored the Moon into this big asteroid that might be hitting us in 2036, or whatever? Could it hit the Moon, or are the chances of that happening so small that it isn't even worth thinking about?

You certainly couldn't depend on the Moon intercepting it. It could - and most probably would - be in the wrong place at the right time. Think of how big it's orbit is and how long it takes to get around it. Very, very small odds indeed!