Why don't the attackers just crack the planet?

[Zubi-Ondo]

A giant high density dust cloud slowing it by friction could do the same thing (never mind that the friction heating or the impact have already melted the whole thing, we're looking for disposal, not just uninhabibility), and it would spiral down to evaporation, but unfortunately the remaining dust, dragged into orbit by conservation of rotary inertia, might well generate a new planet in a billion years or so.

** unfortunately **

?????

So I guess you were disappointed when the Hadron Collider didn't destroy us. I think you and TEIN are part of a conspiracy to put the world out of it's misery ASAP.

Just kidding Chris. I guess I see what you mean. Just because we don't understand gravity doesn't mean it isn't there, right? Even my poking a hole to the core idea would probably end up with the whole mess stuck together. If it did what I'm suggesting, though, it would be pretty spectacular, it could essentially turn the world "inside out".

 

[ktabic]

If someone targeted a iron core asteroid big enough not to burn up on re-entry, couldnt that crack earth like an egg?

Would hardly make a dent. If being hit by a planet the size of Mars didn't do it, iron core asteroids aren't going to cut it.

 

[Scifi fan]

Were we ever hit by a planet the size of Mars? I never heard that. I thought we were just hit by fragments that came from Mars, when that planet was itself bombarded by other fragments, but I never heard of something as big as the Red Planet hitting us.

 

[ktabic]

It's the currently generally accepted method for the formation of the moon. A Mars sized object on the same orbit as the Earth impacts. The resulting debris field coalesce into the Moon.
This all happened within 50 million years of the formation of the Earth (and may be the primary reason that life had a chance to develop on Earth). IIRC the theory also explains why the Earth has a smaller than expected iron core.

 

[TheEndIsNigh]

As it happens channel four had a program with Baldric doing the commentry last night. If you can catch the repeat I think it covers the early bits of the planet. Though you will need to be ready to bang your head against the wall every time he says

"including the dinosaurs"

 

[Ice fyre]

Oooo I think i saw part of that.

As to asteroid, if it hit on the super volcano fault line just under the surface of Yellowstone park I once heard about, woulnt that do it?

 

[TheEndIsNigh]

It would certainly give it a headache.

I think we need something a bit less violent.

Maybe a butterfly flapping it's wings sets of a cataclysmic chain reaction where the Earth just bursts at the seems and every tectonic plate just looses cohesion and flies of into space

 

[Ice fyre]

Now that is a fantastic idea, we could make into a movie.

We could call it "The flap of Doom" a rouge butterfly hunter could be at odds with his bosses at the NSA and have to track down the Butterfly of Doom. He would be typically grim and hard drinking (like most butterfly hunters) unshaven to give the girls a thrill. There would have to be a female interest, and enemy chaos butterfly cultists would be trying to get the butterfly to its correct spot to finish the world.

Hmm, think I have to pop off down to copyright office...

 

[Pyan]

I'd read Terry Pratchett's Interesting Times before getting too excited about it, Ice...IIRC, the Butterfly of Doom features quite heavily in that...

 

[TheEndIsNigh]

Bu**er, another great idea down the pan Ice.

 

[Scifi fan]

I'm reading the Halo series, which talk of the alien enemy going and "glassing" every human planet they come across, meaning that they melt it, I guess. And, in the Babylon 5 TV series, the Vorlons went around destroying any planet that had contact with the Shadows.

So there is a good number of stories involving the destruction of planets. I think that any combat story would have to explain why one side invades the planet instead of destroying it. The reason may have to be wanting the minerals, or wanting the biological material for genetic engineering, or simply wanting it as a base - but there must be an explanation.

 

[Interference]

They want our apples.