• Question: what happens if the planets crash together?

    Asked by Jodie to Jillian on 18 Jun 2015.
    • Photo: Jillian Scudder

      Jillian Scudder answered on 18 Jun 2015:

      If any large planet sized objects crash into each other, you get a huge mess. Generally you destroy the surface of both planets, if they’re rocky planets like the earth, and fling a bunch of material up into space. (This is actually how we think we got our moon!) If they’re gas giants, it’s a bit harder to tell – though we have watched a comet hit Jupiter, and it left deep dark marks on the surface, which was probably layers of gas normally further down in the planet!

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