Space Oddity Alert! Discover the Most Uncommon Facts Hiding in the Cosmos!

you take off from Earth and park your spacecraft somewhere near the moon you're now almost 240 000 miles away from your home planet that's almost 100 widths of the United States now you take out a giant hammer and an enormous chisel using the robotic arms of your spaceship you place the Chisel at the Earth's north pole and strike its head with the hammer Earth splits open like an eggshell and you see it another planet it's Thea and it's hiding inside our planet like a yolk in an egg you'd need to go back in time 4.5 billion years to find out how it got there this beautiful nebula will soon become our solar system colored dust and various space debris are slowly coming closer toward the Common Center soon this jigsaw puzzle of debris becomes too heavy and dense the temperature inside the giant is rising soon it gets so high that it triggers a nuclear chain reaction Another Second and Bam there's an explosion so powerful that the shock waves travel far into dark space and the blinding Flash from this blast can be seen from the other side of the Milky Way galaxy when the dust clears a little you can see that a bright light is still shining at the very center of the explosion this newborn star is the sun it weighs as much as 333 000 Earths if the sun was a bucket you'd need 1.3 million earth-sized planets to fill it you are interested in a small object over there 93 million miles away from the Sun this pile of rocks and hot lava is Earth right now the planet is busy forming its core while the oceans of lava are gradually cooling down but a few tens of million years after the sun's birth you notice a strange object hurtling toward Earth it's Thea this small planet was born at about the same time as Earth and now it's following a crazy spiral trajectory at enormous speed scientists believe Thea was kind of a ball Jupiter and Venus played with Venus was pulling Thea in One Direction then Big Brother Jupiter pulled it back but the sun makes up 99.8 percent of the mass of the entire solar system that's why the star sets its own rules it makes Thea move in almost the same orbit as Earth so they inevitably come closer and closer to each other until they become next door neighbors we see that Thea is the size of Mars and as wide as the Atlantic Ocean from New York to Portugal [Music] a collision can't be avoided Thea is traveling toward Earth at nearly 9 000 miles per hour that's 11 times faster than the speed of sound if the smaller Planet crashes into Earth at a particular angle Earth will most likely be torn apart as well as Thea itself the Collision will cause a huge blast visible on other planets even on a bright day nothing will be left but some burning dust and debris even if Thea touches Earth only lightly it'll still knock out a chunk of our planet the size of Australia but the collision with Thea happens at a perfect 45 degree angle it strikes the Earth at tremendous speed the explosion literally vaporizes huge amounts of rock and the shock wave sends the remaining debris into Earth's orbit a huge crater is formed at the impact site soon it gets filled with boiling lava the remnants of Thea and the ejected fragments of earth begin to orbit our planet according to one version these fragments form Two Moons at first they travel together but one day they get too close to each other and Collide forming one large space body the other Theory claims that all the shards start being pulled by the remnants of Thea some time later they form the moon as we now know it at that point in the past though it's just Red Hot Rock and lava the collision at this angle slightly tilts our planet and accelerates its rotation it's because of Thea that we have different seasons and 24 hours in a day Earth has lithospheric plates these are enormous solid pieces that make up the crust of our planet after the collision with Thea they start to break and crack it causes carbon a primary component of all known life on Earth to start moving all over our planet so Earth gets some kind of metabolism after a few hundred million years the first living creatures start to appear on our planet over nearly 4 billion years simple single-celled organisms have been evolving into the life you see today according to scientists such a collision is a very rare event the probability that somewhere out there there's a planet like ours that has survived the same catastrophe is extremely small this may be the reason why we are yet to find traces of other civilizations out there in space meanwhile the remains of Thea are still here on Earth of course it doesn't look like an entire planet stuck inside our own most of the fragments have melted and blended into the Earth's crust if you take the top layer off our planet you'll see two huge lava blobs the size of entire continents they're right below Africa and the Pacific Ocean presumably these are the remains of Thea they didn't mix with Earth's mantle because of different densities it's like mixing water and oil in a glass the oil will always float up over the water and create an even layer on top of it but if you raise those lava patches up to the surface they'd be 100 times higher than Mount Everest other remains of Thea might be on the moon the Apollo space missions brought back many soil samples for analysis scientists have concluded that the Moon is very similar to Earth and structure people could drill deep down and take samples there then they'd analyze the blobs from Earth if their structure matched it'd be 100 proof that Thea did hit Earth 4.5 billion years ago and that's how he got the Moon but for the time being Thea remains somewhat mysterious ah Earth the Third Rock From the Sun the Blue Planet you get it its atmosphere is made up of around 78 nitrogen 21 oxygen and one percent argon water vapor and carbon dioxide a nice balance for any living creatures to breathe the weather here is also perfect for life to exist unlike places like Saturn Mercury or any other celestial object in our solar system we have the troposphere to thank for that it's the densest part of the atmosphere on our planet and is five to nine miles wide it's the layer of the atmosphere that always affects our weather and secures the right conditions for life to exist and to have bodies of water Earth is just sitting in its orbital path minding its own business revolving around the Sun until bam Venus and Mars swoop in and spoil the fun no one wants to leave poor Earth alone these two relatively large celestial objects moving toward Earth will have dire consequences for our planet starting with changes in its orbiting trajectory path the planet's orbits in the solar system have to maintain the right balance so that nothing goes Haywire of course if any large object approaches Earth they would throw our orbiting path off course the planets will revolve around each other which will cause plenty of natural disasters on our lands this will also affect our rotation timing potentially slowing it down days will not flow but drag by animals that rely on daytime will need to readjust their biological clocks nocturnal animals will also need to figure out how to cope with the long nights humans have adjusted pretty well to the 24 hours a day timing time itself is just a human construct to measure things we'll have a tough time sleeping and adjusting to the stretched day marine animals rely on the natural current flow to migrate around the oceans with Mars and Venus crashing the party it looks like they will also need to find New Paths Birds migrating to other lands throughout the year will also be confused and not know what to do in general the Earth's temperature will rise and massive heat waves and permanent climate changes will occur this brings us to our next issue the heat the radical temperature rise will turn everything into a Barren desert it'll be summer all year long especially if Venus is in the picture most of the planet will dry up and won't be suitable for growing crops Venus is hot I mean really hot even though it's not the closest planet to the sun it's still the hottest the temperatures on Venus are close to 900 degrees Fahrenheit which will melt you like an ice cube the lands on Venus are generally flat probably due to the temperatures it's mainly hot because its atmosphere is thick and traps the Hazardous gases inside if Venus inches its way towards us it'll invite those gases to our atmosphere and compromise it Mars or the red planet as we know it is very cold that might stay the same if it starts rotating around us it's also home to the largest dormant volcano in our solar system which makes Mount Everest look like a tiny Bush compared to a tree with so much instability it might just wake up one day and spew up molten lava Mars has a very thin atmosphere which makes the planet Chiller its gravity is quite similar to ours it's actually very cold and has ice caps in the poles covered with carbon dioxide the same is true for mercury you can only last there as long as you can hold your breath and be in The Sweet Spot between the sunrise and sunset the three planets orbiting each other will eventually Collide it's just a matter of time and the moon just hanging out like a fly on the wall will be so insignificant that something will eventually throw it off course and another planet will capture to its orbit or in the most dire case it will collide with one of the two intruding planets Earth will experience extreme tidal waves like nothing before the two new planets revolving around Earth will cause a major imbalance making our gravity shift out of control each tidal wave will be bigger than the previous one and will cover the dry land plenty of little scattered islands in the oceans will be completely submerged coastal cities and towns will also be home to fish flat countries in general will need boats to get around dams and dikes won't be enough to stop the water from coming in everyone needs to move towards Higher Ground to escape the floods with the climate getting hotter the polar caps will melt like ice cream on a sweltering summer day and add to the water level rising within a few months the whole Arctic will be nothing but liquid but wait there's more the crust will wear out due to the instability of the Earth's surface and fluctuating Gravity the Earth's crust is mainly made up of oxygen which means we're basically walking on air we might experience more earthquakes than before and dormant volcanoes will wake up from their deep Slumber the skies will be covered in Ash making flights impossible no one can travel by sea or by air importing and exporting will become history the overall climate will get hotter just like in Venus the three planets orbiting each other and their huge mass might even unintentionally welcome other planets and celestial bodies to join the party Frozen Plains mountains with white Peaks glistening in the distant sun and rustic Red Snow welcome to Pluto where nothing makes sense anymore looking at it from a distance the ice ball planet is mostly predictably winter shades of white and light blue once you land on the surface you'll notice familiar blue skies as well but see that whale-shaped red stain running along the Equator right there to the left of the white heart-shaped region there she blows this spot is bigger than Alaska and it's a mystery to scientists that's not red clay soil or anything you'll see on Earth that's Pluto's version of eyes scientists believe it's red because the atmosphere drops this strained suit-like chemical called thola on the surface it's the same stuff that explains the red cap on Pluto's Moon Sharon now let's zoom in closer on the whale oh look we have a mountain range yes Pluto's Red Ice is like rock hard enough to form into entire mountains those white Peaks standing out against the dark red aren't snowy caps like we have on Earth that's frozen methane for such a small planet Pluto's mountains are epic bigger than Everest and made entirely of ice such a bizarre landscape can't be found anywhere else in our solar system yeah Pluto is a pretty harsh cold place temperatures there can dip to minus 400 degrees Fahrenheit the coldest ever recorded on Earth was in Antarctica a measly minus 135. now let's head back to the heart of Pluto that's actually a vast plain covered in nitrogen eyes scientists discover that Pluto's heart makes the winds on the planet blow craters are also big and some of them show signs of filling and erosion that's something that happens right here on Earth when land is worn away and shaped by natural forces like wind water and ice that's erosion so what makes all this so special on Pluto it could be evidence of tectonic plate activity you know big plates of land surfing on liquid rock forming Mountain trains breaking continents apart putting them back together that's something scientists so far have only ever seen on Earth not on any other planet in the solar system now looks like Pluto could be more like our own planet that and there's water on Pluto one third of its surface in fact but of course it's not like earth water it's more like a rocky slushy yum still no signs of Life out there at least not for now it's taken a long time to get the little information we know about Pluto it was first discovered almost 100 years ago and deemed the ninth planet from the sun until 2006 when its official Planet membership card was revoked Poor Pluto it was dubbed the biggest dwarf planet in the Kuiper belt a region outside our solar system full of other dwarf planets and icy bodies circling the Sun a few months before that they launched the New Horizons Mission it was the first space probe researchers sent to Pluto in 2006 zipping at over 35 000 miles per hour that's 45 times the speed of sound it still took the probe almost a decade to reach its destination that's how far away the tiny planet is in fact Pluto is nearly 40 times the distance from Earth to the sun if you were there looking up at the sky you'd see the Sun as a tiny dot like any other star in the sky once New Horizons finally reach Pluto in 2015 it got close enough to get some incredible pictures of the surface it also collected important data and observations like those strange red spots and that heart-shaped region but Pluto gets even stranger especially its orbit most other planets go around the Sun in almost perfect circles with the sun close to the center the sun is nowhere near the center of Pluto's orbit and the orbit is so stretched out that Pluto sometimes crosses into Neptune's path and gets closer to the Sun than the blue gas giant so the unusual effect of the strange orbit Pluto sometimes has an atmosphere and sometimes not when it's closer to the Sun a thin atmosphere of nitrogen forms but once the planet starts moving further away from our sun the atmospheres freezes and falls to the surface in an ice storm of epic proportions Pluto is probably a lot smaller than you imagine if you put it on a map of the Earth it would only span about halfway across the U.S yet this little planet has five moons spinning around it and life on Pluto would be one endless year for us humans imagine no birthdays your whole life since it was discovered in 1930 we still haven't seen it complete a full circle around the Sun one year on Pluto is 248 Earth years and we'll finally see that happen on March 23 2178 mark your calendar back when Apollo missions were launched astronauts returning from the Moon claimed that Moon dust the gray sand like dust covering much of the satellite surface smelled and tasted yes they actually tasted it like gunpowder but the stuff Moon dust is made of is nothing like gunpowder about half of its composition is silicon dioxide glass from impacts with meteorites they hit the surface of the Moon at incredible speeds whoa the high temperature makes the topsoil will fuse into glass and the impact shatters it right afterwards creating the gray and clingy dust the rest of moon dust ingredients are minerals such as iron calcium and magnesium while old-fashioned gunpowder consist mainly of saltpeter charcoal and sulfur in other words Moon dust shouldn't smell like gunpowder but it does besides when astronauts brought samples of it back to Earth there was no smell left at all when explanation could be that the Moon is similar in a way to Earth's sand deserts like the Sahara it's extremely dry and arid when you sniff the air in a desert you don't smell anything but if you get caught in the rain there the moisture will raise all kinds of odors from the ground that were previously trapped in the dry sand with moon dust it might be similar while on the surface of the Moon it doesn't smell at all not that the astronauts could sniff at it wearing their spacesuits though but when brought back inside the landing module the dust came into contact with moisture in the air and started emitting its strange odor another reason for this could be a reaction of moon dust to the solar wind ionized particles from the Sun hit the bare surface of the Moon and stay there there's no thick atmosphere to protect it from those ions so they travel freely right to the ground they're very lightweight so they can fly off and sort of evaporate from the slightest of nudges and when astronauts took the moon dust samples to The Landing module those particles could have started moving around and giving off the specific smell this might also explain why the samples didn't keep the rotor when brought back to Earth since the particles are so light they might have flown off the samples already in the landing module and when they were placed in airtight containers there were little or no ions left on them another explanation is that those airtight containers weren't so airtight after all Moon dust is basically very small crystals with extremely sharp edges they unexpectedly made tiny Cuts in the seals letting in air and moisture and so the ionized particles leaked out of the containers scientists believe they should study Moon dust on the surface of the Moon itself to find out everything about its properties now there are hundreds of thousands of craters on the surface of the Moon made by Falling asteroids but one of them drew a lot of attention it turned out to not be just an impact crater but a tube looking most like an entrance to a Cave System scientists found a specific Echo pattern that suggested there was a hollow area beneath they discovered more Echo patterns at a couple of places near the hole so there could be more lunar tubes there but in this big tube you could place an entire football field researchers believe there could be an entire geological Wonderland under the surface it could be a good shelter for astronauts landing on the moon or even be a harbor for a lunar Colony no one ever managed to stay on the moon for more than three days because of the conditions on the satellite wide range of temperatures low atmosphere no magnetic field would protect life on the surface from things like radiation or solar wind astronauts wear spacesuits they can't protect them over long periods of time but a lava tube could when a lava flow cools it gets a hard crust which later thickens and creates a roof over that same lava it continues to flow but when it stops the channel can drain and that's how an empty tube appears our planet also has Lava Tubes but they're not as big as the one found on the moon back in 1178 I wasn't around then at least five people in England claim they had seen the moon split into two from its upper tip it was in the shape of a crescent at the time of the event when the crack widened fire started blazing from it which the single monk who chronicled it described it as a flaming torch spraying up spewing out fire hot coals and sparks then the moon started shifting around and pulsating but soon stopped and turned a slightly darker shade.