Free Republic
Browse · Search
General/Chat
Topics · Post Article

To: messierhunter; lingduxingxi
Messierhunter, have you any new information about comet 209P/Linear?

This is all I've seen:
Lingduxingxi, you might want to watch that video.
107 posted on 04/23/2014 9:58:46 PM PDT by Yosemitest (It's Simple ! Fight, ... or Die !)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 102 | View Replies ]


To: Yosemitest

It’s still just a small comet which may give us a nice meteor shower. Your video is just more fear mongering. “The debris will be all sizes.” No, it will be small, not a “danger to earth.” The comet will miss earth by some 8 million kilometers, even if it fragments. We have 34 days until the comet reaches perigee. The separation velocities of comets that fragment are only in the tens of meters per second at best.
“Separation velocities.
The relative speed of the
fragments shortly after the fragmentation event amounts
from 0.1 to 15 m/s with the majority between 0.3 and 4 m/s.”
http://www.lpi.usra.edu/books/CometsII/7011.pdf
Taking the high end of that range, if the comet fragment right this moment at 15m/s separation velocity it would only be able to spread out to a radius of about 44,000 km, orders of magnitude smaller than the 8 million kilometer distance it will have next month.


108 posted on 04/25/2014 11:47:05 AM PDT by messierhunter
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 107 | View Replies ]

Free Republic
Browse · Search
General/Chat
Topics · Post Article


FreeRepublic, LLC, PO BOX 9771, FRESNO, CA 93794
FreeRepublic.com is powered by software copyright 2000-2008 John Robinson