Tag Archives: NASA

This Is What It Would Look Like If A Huge Asteroid Hit The Earth

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Earth has a long list of hits—and not of the musical variety, but of the rocky, celestial sort. In fact, asteroids have slammed into our planet and caused cataclysmic damage many times in its violent past. On less dramatic occassions, Earth is frequently hit with small asteroids that enter and disintegrate in its atmosphere. According to NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Earth was hit by 556 small asteroids between 1994 and 2013. Most don’t make it through the atmosphere, but some—like the Chelyabinsk meteorite—crash-land with considerable force.

What would happen if a larger asteroid collided with Earth? A simulation by the Discovery Channel has provided a visual scenario to take us through it. According to the video’s description box, these are the details: “An asteroid with a diameter of 500 km. Destination: The Pacific Ocean. The impact peels the 10 km crust off the surface. The shockwave travels at hypersonic speeds. Debris is blasted across into low Earth orbit, and returns to destroy the surface of the Earth. The firestorm encircles the Earth, vaporizing all life in its way.”

Amazing Video Takes You INSIDE The Largest Photograph Ever Taken

Earlier this month, NASA and ESA released the biggest and highest resolution image of our galactic neighbor, Andromeda, that has ever been taken. The 1.5 billion pixel image was taken by the Hubble Space Telescope. Each tiny dot of light in the picture represents one of 1 trillion stars in the galaxy; many with their own expansive planetary systems.

As you watch this video and think about Andromeda’s size, remember that this is just a small part compared to the rest of the universe. As large as this galaxy is, it is only one out of 200 billion galaxies in the known universe.