Heavenly flashbangs
Hoo boy! I just love this stuff -- I really do. Those of us in the United States lucky enough to be living west of a line from Chicago to Atlanta will be treated to some heavenly fireworks around 2 a.m. EDT, July 4. Treated, that is, if all goes as planned.
You see, a NASA spacecraft is speeding toward a comet scientists hope to smash open on Independence Day, producing heavenly fireworks as a by-product. The Deep Impact spacecraft was designed to study Tempel 1, a pickle-shaped comet half the size of Manhattan, by colliding with it to study its primordial core. The resulting cosmic light show will not be visible to the naked eye, but viewers with telescopes can witness the collision, scheduled to occur 83 million miles away from our planetary home.
In a scenario reminiscent of recent death-to-planet-by-asteroid movies, the spacecraft will release an 820-pound copper impactor device that will begin a 500,000-mile dive toward the sunlit side of the comet. The impactor will have three chances to correct its flight path to ensure a collision, and as the comet races toward it at 23,000 mph, the spacecraft's cameras will shoot pictures. NASA scientists expect the collision to blast a crater in the comet and hurl the pristine subsurface material out from the resulting pit. It is hoped that by studying the impact debris, clues will be revealed as to how the sun and planets were formed nearly five billion years ago.
So although it won't be as spectacular as your local Independence Day fireworks celebration, those of you living close enough to visit a planetarium with a scheduled viewing are in for a real treat - just remember to "Ooh" and "Ahh" as it happens.