What would happen if a meteor bigger than the earth hit the earth?

Answer 1

Depends on the size, speed, and composition of the asteroid. It could burn up in our atmosphere. It could hit the ground harmlessly as a small grain of sand. It could explode in the lower atmosphere and level thousands of square miles of forest. It could hit the ocean and cause a massive tsunami. It could leave an impact crater the size of Texas and throw enough debris into the atmosphere to start a very long "nuclear winter". It could split the earth in two.

Answer 2

It depends on numerous factors, such as the asteroid's size, composition, trajectory, shape, speed, and other secondary parameters. Clearly if the asteroid is small enough, say, the size that will disintegrate upon entry into the earth's atmosphere (e.g. a mini-meteorite), one need not bother with it. If its size is comparable to that of the earth, then there is nothing one can do about it. If it is anywhere in between, then "it depends".

Detonating an atomic bomb near the asteroid is one possibility that is being investigated, to slightly divert its course. One important condition is that we have sufficient advance notification of the foreseen collision. If we know (say) a few years in advance that an asteroid is on collision course, a small deviation would be enough to change that.

Answer 3

When the comet Shoemaker-Levy 9 passed by the Sun in 1994, the tidal stress shattered the comet into a number of large fragments. Those fragments then smashed into Jupiter like a series of nuclear bombs in July, 1994. The biggest impact may have released an amount of energy equal to a thousand H-bombs.

Even though the first impact was slightly below the horizon on Jupiter from our point of view, the explosion was spectacular when viewed with telescopes here on Earth, and the Hubble Space Telescope. The impacts left enormous black blemishes in the clouds of Jupiter, and those blemishes were visible for months.

Had such a series of comet fragments hit the Earth, it most likely would have killed off all large animal species on Earth - including the species we call "man".

If you've ever wondered what the point of the space program is, it's so that when something like this DOES strike the Earth, there will be some humans living elsewhere - and we won't have, as the saying goes, all of our eggs in one basket. Because it WILL happen eventually.

Answer 4

The atmosphere causes small meteors to slow down and lose kinetic energy, which appears as heat which burns them away before they reach the ground. All we see uually is a shooting star.

An asteroid is too big for this to happen but they tend to have stable orbits which keep them away.

Answer 5

If the other body were bigger than the Earth, we would call it a "rogue planet", and the collision would ruin your ENTIRE day. And everybody else's.

We believe that another planet perhaps as large as Mars collided with the proto-Earth early in our planet's history; the debris from the collision formed the Moon.

Answer 6

As with any asteroid strike, a lot depends on mass and velocity. If the asteroid was the size of Alaska but was as dense as cotton wool, and impacted at a velocity of 10 miles per hour, Alaska would become the worlds largest producer of cotton wool.

In reality asteroids are a lot denser and hit the earth with much higher velocities.

Asteroids hit the Earth fairly frequently but most are destroyed in the upper astrosphere with as much force as the Hiroshima nuclear bomb.

The asteroid that wiped out the dinosaurs was only 6 miles across, Alaska is 2,261 miles across - 377 times larger that the Chicxulub impact.

Needless to say, all life would be wiped out in an instant. The blast wave would sweep around the Earth, destroying everything in its path.

Answer 7

Nothing.

Depending on the size of the asteroid, the impact speed and the location of impact. A lot would depend on where you were. Generally, you and everyone else would die, either from the initial shock wave or from associated events preceding the event.

Asteroids with a diameter of about 5 -> 10 m hit the Earths atmosphere about once every year but are vaporised by the atmosphere with the power of a Hiroshima nuclear bomb.

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If you had enough advance notice (which would be unlikely; small asteroids are difficult to see!) it might be possible to flee. The only way to survive an asteroid impact is to be someplace else.

Answer 8

Such a thing is impossible. A large asteroid could potentially puncture the thinner parts of the crust and enter the mantle, but it would never make it anywhere near the core. Gas emissions from the mantle could alter the climate in such an event.

Answer 9

It would be the other way round: basically, the Earth would fall on the neutron star. Because of its much, much larger mass (about a million times larger than Earth), the neutron star would probably hardly be affected; but Earth would be utterly destroyed (and become part of the neutron star).

Answer 10

Just to begin; an asteroid IS going to hit the Earth. We just don't know WHEN. Or how big. Or how fast. The Earth has been hit before - MANY times before - and unless we humans intercept it, another will hit us. Probably not this year or next, but sometime within the next 100,000 years, an asteroid WILL intercept the Earth's orbit.

What will happen? That depends on how big it is, and how fast, and where it hits.