How big was the explosion when that comet hit Jupiter? How much of Earth could it have wiped out?
819014
The first impact occurred at 20:15 UTC on July 16, 1994, when fragment A of the nucleus slammed into Jupiter's southern hemisphere at a speed of about 60 km/s. Instruments on Galileo detected a fireball which reached a peak temperature of about 24,000 K, compared to the typical Jovian cloudtop temperature of about 130 K, before expanding and cooling rapidly to about 1500 K after 40 s. The plume from the fireball quickly reached a height of over 3,000 km [3]. A few minutes after the impact fireball was detected, Galileo measured renewed heating, probably due to ejected material falling back onto the planet. Earth-based observers detected the fireball rising over the limb of the planet shortly after the initial impact [4].\n\nAstronomers had expected to see the fireballs from the impacts, but did not have any idea in advance how visible the atmospheric effects of the impacts would be from Earth. Observers soon saw a huge dark spot after the first impact. The spot was visible even in very small telescopes, and was about 6,000 km (one Earth radius) across. This and subsequent dark spots were thought to have been caused by debris from the impacts, and were markedly asymmetric, forming crescent shapes in front of the direction of impact.\n\nOver the next 6 days, 21 discrete impacts were observed, with the largest coming on July 18 at 07:34 UTC when fragment G struck Jupiter. This impact created a giant dark spot over 12,000 km across, and was estimated to have released an energy equivalent to 6,000,000 megatons of TNT (750 times the world's nuclear arsenal). Two impacts 12 hours apart on July 19 created impact marks of similar size to that caused by fragment G, and impacts continued until July 22, when fragment W struck the planet.\n\n\nId imagine that a fair bit of the earth would of been wiped out given those figures
423720
Sure, in simple terms the main theory right now is that of a large meteoritic impact, proposed back in 1980.  It fits the requirement of a rapid and sudden kill-off event.  What killed the dinosuars?  Well the immediate effect of a large asteroid impact would be global firestorms.  The ejecta reaches low earth orbit and then superheats as it re-enters the atmosphere.  This pretty much covers much of the planet in fire.  Other bad things happen, toxic metals in the air and water, dust obscuring the sun, many bad things, but the main killing factor is the global fire storm.\n\nAs scientists we really like the asteroid impact theory as it is supported with the following eveidence (I have not heard any serious arguments about a double impact by the way):\n\n1. The boundry layer in which the extinction occured is ultra-rich in the element irridum.  These irridium levels are not found on earth, but match very well to those of meteoritic samples that we have.  This boundry layer with irridium has been found all over the globe.\n\n2. Shocked quartz deposits have been found in the regions near central to lower north america, indicating a large shockwave propagated across the area\n\n3. Tiny glass beads have been found in the same regions, with larger ones more concentrated near the Yucatan.  Thes glass bead are most closely related to objects we call Tektites, glass that forms from meteorite impact ejecta.  (cool science thing: you can get tektites for a couple dollars at any rock shop!)\n\n4. Tsunami deposits from that era have been found in the gulf of mexico region, indicating massive tidal wave events\n\n5. A crater caused an impact large enough to cause all of these things has been found right on the coast of the Yucatan, centered on Chicxulub, and dating to the right time period.
157349
There was a mysterious explosion.  The explosion was extreamly powerful (on the scale of atomic bombs I believe), flatting trees all around.  But it wasnt for a number of years that people were able to get up there and try find out what happened.\n\nIt possible could have been a meteor explosion right before it hit the ground, but there is no other evidence to support this.  I dont think we really know what happened, but the meteor idea is pretty likely I think.
690955
Go onto the Net and search for NEO's (Near Earth Objects) and you can download all the Data you need. Generally we are hit by a very large body every 200,000 years. Check out Tunguska in Siberia on the Net, where a comet exploded in the upper atmosphere, flattening 100,s of 1000,s of square kilometres of forest in 1908. JULES
437156
Sure, the main theory right now is that of a large meteoritic impact, first seriously proposed back in 1980. It fits the requirement of a rapid and sudden kill-off event. What killed the dinosuars? Well the immediate effect of a large asteroid impact would be global firestorms. The ejecta reaches low earth orbit and then superheats as it re-enters the atmosphere. This pretty much covers much of the planet in fire. Other bad things happen, toxic metals in the air and water, dust obscuring the sun, many bad things, but the main killing factor is the global fire storm.\n\nAs scientists we really like the asteroid impact theory as it is supported with the following evidence:\n\n1. The boundry layer in which the extinction occured is ultra-rich in the element irridum. These high concentrations of irridium are not found on earth, but match very well to those of meteoritic samples that we have. This boundry layer with irridium has been found all over the globe.\n\n2. Shocked quartz deposits have been found in the regions near central to lower north america, indicating a large shockwave propagated across the area\n\n3. Tiny glass beads have been found in the same regions, with larger ones more concentrated near the Yucatan. Thes glass bead are most closely related to objects we call Tektites, a glass that forms from meteorite impact ejecta. (cool science thing: you can get tektites for a couple dollars at any rock shop!)\n\n4. Tsunami deposits from that era have been found in the gulf of mexico region, indicating massive tidal wave events\n\n5. A crater caused an impact large enough to cause all of these things has been found right on the coast of the Yucatan, centered on Chicxulub, and dating to the right time period.
891496
the first 2 answers are sadly wrong, were you around in 1995 when shoemaker-levy 9 hit jupiter,  the asteroid was what is called a "rubble pile".  a collection a rocks all held together by there mutual gravity till the stronger pull of jupiter pulled it apart into a dozen pieces. when SL9 hit the gas giant astronomers on earth thought nothing would happen.  that the rocks would just slip into the clouds and be gone,  but thats not what happend.\n\nmassive plooms of material were ejected hundreds of miles up into space leaving behind large dark spot on the surface clouds of jupiter that were still there for several years.  check out the link for pics of the aftermath.  each dark spot is the size of the earth
577213
If the tail of a comet disappears, it means that it is outside the distance from the sun at which it is being boiled by the solar wind. Until it is completely dispersed, or crashes into a planet or moon, it will continue on its outward path until it begins to fall back into the sun, and when it is close enough, it will again begin to boil in the raging storm of particles blasted out by the sun.\nSince comets (we now understand) are composed of "dirty ice" full of complex compounds, it may be possible that a comet impacting the ancient Earth brought the "spark of life" to our world.\nSo if you want to think of comet tails as "going out" and if you want to regard them with awe and worship, by all means do so. You may be right.
989676
11 times more mass is the threshold for fusion.  Jupiter would then be a brown dwarf, and the solar system would be a binary star system.\n\nIf Jupiter would suddenly become 11 times more massive in its current orbit, then yes it would spiral into the sun ... but even before that happened, a sudden increase by 11x of the gravity of Jupiter, would throw all the orbits of all the planets in the solar system into total chaos.  Depending on where the earth was in its orbit relative to Jupiter, the earth would either be pulled into the sun, or pulled out of its orbit. \n\nNow had Jupiter originally formed 11 times larger, then it would not be in its current orbit, but would be much further away if the solar system were to have planets at all.  The orbits of the other planets would not be as circular.  With a non-circular orbit, it's less likely that life would has evolved quite as well as it has, and there probably wouldn't be any creature talking about this on the Internet.
460102
Depends on the size of the comet, many just disintegrate on the atmosphere. A really big one could create:\nShift in the orbit, heat from the explosion, smoke and dust from the explosion covering the Sun. Earthquakes and volcanic eruptions from shift in magnetic field due to orbit shift. Basically extinction of many forms of life, possibly even human.
85550
All the other known planets in our solar system would fit inside Jupiter with room left over --\n\nThe Great Red Spot on Jupiter is a hurricane-like storm with a diameter three times that of Earth --\n\nJupiter's chemical composition is the same as that of stars --\n\nIf Jupiter had about 100 times more mass it would have been a star --\n\nJupiter radiates heat into space from its interior, but the source isn't completely understood
747685
You have to learn how to do simple arithmetic, and understand simple physics like the conservation of momentum and the conservation of energy.\n\nThen you will see that the effect of the biggest possible nuclear explosion on the Earth's orbit is like the effect of an insect landing on the Empire State Building.  The Earth has been pushed by radiation from solar flares with enormously more energy, hit by asteroids with enormously more momentum, than any puny little man-made nuclear explosion, and its orbit was still not affected measurably.
381332
The earth will not explode.  No, whoever said the sun will go supernova failed pre-k.  Ignore them.  Anyway, the earth can not explode, nor can any other planet pretty muc.  The Astroid belt would be to small to be a  destroyed planet, for it would be smaller than pluto if all the rocks were to be put together.  The only way the earth could exploide is with the colision of and object about 4x the size of earth if it was solid...and that, by almost all laws of physics, is impossible.\n\nEdit:\n\nOh, your also asking for the end of the world.  Very well.\n\nThe sun is 4.5 billion years old scientists estimate.  The sun eventually, in 4.5 billion years, swell into a red giant.  It will expand very far, and the earth will be engulped.  Plant life will die, the earth will become dry, and very few organisms will survive.  Eventually, the heat will evaporate the atmoshpere away.  The sun might swallow up the earth, and the earth will be devoured and broken apart from gravity if im correct.  Edit any posts and correct me if im wrpong.  If im not wrong and you correct me, watch how badly I flame your ***\n\nEdit2:\n\nOmfg how many people dont understand!  My god, you idiots!  Comon, a planet getting sucked into a blakc hole?!  YOu retatrds!  Your kidding me right? If your actually voted as the best answer, then the world truly will explode!  You people know nothing in life!\n\nAnyway, at the guy who says the earths core is a neuclear reactor:\n\nThe earth yes might be getting hotter, but that is no reason for it to explode.  Im not saying im with the media, Im only saying that the earths not in any real danger yet.  Im saying that I think It will last some time...but you do have a pont.  I'll do some looking into it.  Gotta show this to my buds on other forums.  Afk.\n\nPs. Good job for playgerizing the whole article but 2 words, by the way!
516884
For more info that you could possibly want to know:\nhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jupiter_(planet)
332248
Look, a 1000 megaton detonation (whether it was due to a nuclear device or due to a meteor impact) would blow the line-of-site atmosphere into space.  We'd all suffer direly if that happened.\n\nA 10,000 megaton (or 10 gigaton) device would locally shatter the crust, and produce a surface wave that would do major damage to the crust all across the world.  Think of a bell: whack it hard enough anywhere and the whole thing rings, and if the whack is hard enough, the temporary standing waves would possibly shatter or crack the bell.  If you don't believe me, look at the Liberty Bell--that crack is (supposedly) due to it being rung hard enough.  Imagine that with the crust of the earth!  Pretty, it ain't.\n\nFrankly, nuclear weaponry is a silly approach to such an effort.  Throw rocks from orbit--you can get nuclear grade energies easily, and you can do it without any radiation.
211199
Yes, in fact Jupiter is alive right now.  Remember that comet it ate a few years back? The shoemaker-Levy? You think that was an ACCIDENT?\n\nJupiter's big red eye is watching you ...
494439
With an orbit of where earth is, 149,600,000 km, that's a surface area of 7.12383E+15 km², i think...\n\nYou can fit approx. 11,700 earths in a single ring around the sun, so you can imagine the amount of materials needed for a dyson sphere is pretty massive! (although Jupiter is more than a 1000 times more massive than the earth!)\n\nI think you might even need to destroy whole solar systems to get the materials required, but the planets, moons & asteriod belt would be a good place to start, assuming you need specific materials like metals especially.\n\nDon't even think about the cost!
255328
Umm, there isn't that much radioactivity inside the earth.  Its mostly due to heavier elements sinking down to lower portions of the earth.  the other terrestial planets have done this as well.  The moon was separated by an  impact back when most of earth was still molten.  It didn't have the gravitational energy to perform this action that's happenin here.  Mars is much smaller than us, and Venus is still very active.  Mercury is so close to the sun it got "baked" dry.  No one really knows for certain about the Jovian planets since no probe can survive much further than a few hundred miles into their atmospheres, if that.  And for the person who thinks the earth is the :youngest: planet, don't post stupid answers.  All the planets were formed essentially at the same time as the sun.  The age is generally defined as when fusion "turned on" in the sun which blasted away all the smaller debris in the solar system and "froze" out planet formation.  This debris is what is now called the oort cloud that surrounds the solar system in a spherical fashion.