Timeline for Is it possible for an asteroid to be captured by earth in such a way that it has minimal relative velocity?
Current License: CC BY-SA 4.0
16 events
| when toggle format | what | by | license | comment | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| May 12, 2018 at 23:02 | vote | accept | Eric Hauenstein | ||
| May 11, 2018 at 21:56 | answer | added | Tom Spilker | timeline score: 6 | |
| May 11, 2018 at 17:53 | review | Close votes | |||
| May 12, 2018 at 8:59 | |||||
| May 11, 2018 at 17:34 | comment | added | Eric Hauenstein | Possible duplicate of Can one put a large nickel-iron asteroid into an elliptical solar orbit that results in a soft(ish) earth landing? | |
| May 11, 2018 at 17:33 | comment | added | Eric Hauenstein | Looks like this question is actually a duplicate of this one: space.stackexchange.com/questions/4935/… | |
| May 11, 2018 at 17:28 | comment | added | Mark Adler | What do you mean by "dropped from a height"? What height? What velocity relative to Earth at that height? | |
| May 11, 2018 at 17:10 | comment | added | Eric Hauenstein | @Acccumulation I believe so. In short, is it possible for a large asteroid to arrive at a location outside the Earth's atmosphere where it will behave as if it were simply falling from that height? If so, is there a minimum height or maximum size where this is possible? | |
| May 11, 2018 at 16:47 | comment | added | Acccumulation | Do you mean minimal tangential velocity, with it still having radial velocity from its gravitational potential energy turning into kinetic energy? | |
| May 11, 2018 at 16:33 | history | tweeted | twitter.com/StackSpaceExp/status/994978812642328578 | ||
| May 11, 2018 at 15:43 | comment | added | uhoh | ...but that wouldn't rule out a four-body solution (Earth, Moon, Asteroid plus the Sun). Slightly related: Have there been any documented mini-moons since 2006 RH120? and also see How would a small TCO (temporarily captured orbiter) or other natural Earth satellite most likely be detected? and also perhaps How was Earth's “quasi-satellite” 2016 HO3 “first spotted” and it's orbit determined? | |
| May 11, 2018 at 15:35 | comment | added | uhoh | My first thought is "unlikely" because the chances of a low velocity object near the Earth accelerating and escaping to heliocentric orbit are not likely either. For some types of problems you can run a problem backwards in time since gravity is a conserving force. In a strict circular 3-body (CR3BP) scenario there is a conserved quantity called the Jacobi integral so whatever the answer turns out to be, the proof will likely come from that. | |
| May 11, 2018 at 14:28 | comment | added | Magic Octopus Urn | sciencealert.com/… - there's a few examples... Haven't been able to find much on the logistics of the entry into the atmosphere though. I'd assume with how old those instances are, any posts about the trajectory would be conjecture. | |
| May 11, 2018 at 14:17 | comment | added | Eric Hauenstein | @MagicOctopusUrn Right, I wouldn't expect a gentle landing. A giant rock falling from several km would not be something to observe up close. | |
| May 11, 2018 at 14:02 | comment | added | Magic Octopus Urn | It'd probably have to be slowed by the moon first (or be slow to begin with) just perfectly to enter an aerocapture with earth that slowly reduces the apoapsis after multiple passes without dipping too low. Then again this is just conjecture. I have no idea if asteroids could survive an aerocapture, and it would depend on the mass, shape and various other factors such as how much heat resistance the asteroid has. Regardless... the landing will not be pretty, even over water. Imagine a boulder dropped from a plane at best case scenario. | |
| May 11, 2018 at 13:27 | review | First posts | |||
| May 11, 2018 at 13:47 | |||||
| May 11, 2018 at 13:25 | history | asked | Eric Hauenstein | CC BY-SA 4.0 |