Asteroids

Asteroids

Jordan Brosky

http://www.uber-facts.com/2013/02/on-friday-an-asteroid-will-fly-right-by-earth/

This is a photo of an asteroid called asteroid 2012 DA14. On February 15th that was predicted to come very close to the earth’s surface. It did enter the Moon’s orbit, but it was 17,200 miles away at its closest point on earth.

http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Wikijunior:Solar_System/Asteroid_belt

This is a diagram of the Asteroid belt. More than 100,000 asteroids are in between Mars and

Jupiter. These asteroids were most likely parts of the earlier planets that have since broken up into these chunks of rock known as asteroids. The asteroid belt goes from the Orbit of Jupiter to the Orbit of Mars.

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=graphic-science

This is a diagram of the asteroids that have come near the Earth.

Asteroids are classified based on their composition, what they are made of. The three major types are the C-type, S-type and M-type but there are several rare types of asteroids. C-types are the majority of asteroids, they are very dark and they have a similar composition to the sun although they do not have hydrogen or helium in them. S-types are relatively bright asteroids made up of mostly metallic nickel-iron. Lastly, the M-type is bright and it is pure nickel-iron.

Physicist Luis Alvarez and his son geologist Walter Alvarez were the first people to discover the idea that it could have been an asteroid that hit the Earth 65 million years ago, killing the dinosaurs. This asteroid struck the Earth on the coast of Mexico. This asteroid is thought to be 6 miles in diameter. This asteroid left behind a giant crater near the Yucatan Peninsula in Mexico, which is the evidence left behind by this asteroid. Scientist later discovered that there was a layer of iridium covering the Earth’s surface due to the impact of something that had exploded. This impact which must have been from the asteroid was probably so large that its mass was thrown up into the atmosphere therefore killing the dinosaurs.

The first photo included in this blog post, was of an asteroid that came very close to earth not that long ago. On February 15th, 2013 an asteroid passed by the Earth at record distance of 17,100 miles. The asteroid is known as, 2012 DA14 and is estimated to be about 30 meters in diameter with a weight of 40,000 metric tons.

http://www.space.com/14810-asteroid-earth-impact-risk-2012da14.htm

This is a diagram of how close the asteroid 2012 DA14 came to the earth.

Asteroids as well as the asteroid belt, can be a huge help to scientist to put pieces together and help scientist figure out new things about what our solar system once was. Debris is fragments of the remains of something that had been destroyed or broken up. In the asteroid belt, there are approximately 300,000 pieces of debris spread out in the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter. These pieces cannot compact and become a planet due to the very strong gravity in the area surrounding Jupiter and its orbit. Knowing this fact, visiting the asteroid belt is similar to traveling back in time to see what space when like for the construction of Earth and other similar planets.

When we see flashes of light up in the nights sky, that is generally a meteor. This flash of light is caused by burning debris passing through our atmosphere. Debris is not the actual meteor, it is the flash of light caused by the debris that is known as a meteor.

 

http://reachingutopia.com/tag/meteor/

This is a photo of a meteor.

The actual debris is known as a meteoroid. This is a piece of matter that is often less than a kilometer in size. Meteoroids rarely make it to earth due to their size. When they travel through the atmosphere they generally condense or vaporize before they reach the surface of the planet they are heading towards.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meteoroid

This is a photo of meteoroids traveling through the nights sky.

If any part meteoroid does make it to Earth, it is then referred to as a meteorite but only once it lands on the Earths surface. Although this is rare some meteoroids do make it to Earth. Meteorites range in sizes from approximately the size of a pebble to the size of a large bolder.

http://www.astronomynotes.com/solfluf/s3.htm

This is an image of a meteorite.

A shooting star is often what people refer to a meteor or meteoroid entering the Earths atmosphere.  Shootings stars are caused when a meteor or meteoroid burns up as it enters the atmosphere which happens often making it seems as if a star is falling, giving us the term shooting star.