4 ms·
Not a planetary/astrophysics/whatever scientist myself, but the page mentions "the arrival at or near Earth of multiple coronal mass ejections (CMEs) that have
by k_sze 4y ago
Not a planetary/astrophysics/whatever scientist myself, but the page mentions "the arrival at or near Earth of multiple coronal mass ejections (CMEs) that have departed the Sun since 14 Aug"
Assuming the CMEs arrive around 18 Aug, and that the distance between the Sun and the Earth is ~150 million km, does that mean CMEs travel at around ~ 150 million km / (4 day * 24h/day) ~= 1.5 million km/h???
- sbierwagen 4y agoYes. About a thousandth of light speed. A CME is a burst of hot plasma released by a magnetic flux line breaking. Considering the energies involved, and the fact there's nothing to get in the way, you could expect it to be moving at a pretty good clip.
- k_sze 4y agoThat's some scary numbers. Does anybody know how much CME mass (in tonnes or kgs) the Earch bumps into in this kind of event? How much mechanical influence does it exert on Earth?
- r2_pilot 4y agoPractically 0. The Earth masses about 5,973,600,000,000,000,000,000,000 kg, or 5.9 sextillion tonnes. Even if there was 100,000 tonnes of material that Earth intercepted, it's a drop in the bucket. For reference, between 5,200 and 40,000 tonnes of space debris lands on Earth annually.