Asteroids + Comets
Research Methods Class Project
Comets
- A comet is a big formation of ice that is covered in dust and sometimes other materials."dirty snowball."
- Comets are left over material from the formation of planets.
- Planets orbit in a circular pattern where a comet will orbit in a oval shaped pattern. This makes its orbit time a lot longer.
- A comet visible from the Earths surface looks like a glowing star with a streak of light "tail" coming from it. Not visible from the Earths surface it looks like a rock with ice formations on it and no tail is visible.
- A comet tail is formed by the heat of the sun melting little bits of the comet. A comet that does not have a tail is too far away from the sun so it cannot melt away the comet which forms a tail.
Comet Video
The video below shows a comet that could possibly pass by earth and be visible form the surface. They believe this comet could be the comet of the century. There was already a comet marked as the comet of the century but this one is even bigger tan that one. Watch the video to find out more.
Asteroids
- An asteroid is a airless rocky formation that is not big enough to be classified as a planet. Another name for asteroids is planetoids.
- Asteroids and meteorites: A asteroid is larger than a meteorite some even have there own moon. A meteorite is classified as anything that makes it past a planets atmosphere and penetrates the surface.
- A near earth asteroid is an asteroid that has a similar or intersecting orbit with earth.
- On February 15, 2013 an asteroid hit Chelyabinsk, Russia that was 20m of 65ft in diameter.
- The asteroid in the top right corner was found by the Goldstone Deep Space Network it was found using a solar radar.
Asteroid News Article
There is a news article and video of a asteroid 300+ meters in diameter. Russian scientist have recorded it coming our way in its next 3 year orbit cycle. It is estimated to have a 1000 times grater impact force than the surprised 20m asteroid in 2013.