Jupiter turning into a sun? Interesting shit

On September 21, 2003 the space probe Galileo, powered by some 50 pounds of plutonium, crashed into the "gas giant" Jupiter. Numerous scientists and writers, including Carl Sagan and Arthur C. Clarke, have theorized that the plutonium aboard Galileo could trigger a chain reaction in Jupiter's hydrogen atmosphere, turning the brown dwarf star into a binary sun.
In his 1991 underground bestseller, Behold a Pale Horse, ex-CIA agent William Cooper warned that NASA was planning to turn Jupiter into a second sun with the 50 pounds of plutonium supposedly powering Galileo. (Was 50 pounds of plutonium really necessary to power the 14 year mission of a 3,000 pound satellite?)
Arthur C. Clarke speculated upon this possibility in his novel 2010, a sequel to his Kubrick-adapted masterpiece. The book ends with Jupiter exploding precisely in this way, and being renamed Lucifer. Clarke described a monolith crashing into Jupiter, producing a black spot that grew larger until the whole planet turned black, exploding into a star.
On October 24, 2003, SPACE.com reported that "Astronomers have spotted a strange, obvious and inexplicable black spot near the equator of Jupiter." http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/jupiter_dark_spot_031023.html "The first picture of the black spot to circulate among astronomers worldwide was taken Oct. 19 by astrophotographer Olivier Meeckers. The image gained wider attention Wednesday as it was mentioned in astronomy newsletters. It had experts captivated."
On July 30, 2003, http://www.cyberspaceorbit.com/JUPFULLx.htm posted an extremely interesting article: "Nuclear Reaction When Galileo Spacecraft Impacts Into Jupiter In September 2003 Unlikely But Possible." It states: "Jupiter's atmosphere consists of about 81 percent hydrogen and 18 percent helium. If Jupiter had been between fifty and a hundred times more massive, it might have evolved into a star rather than a planet. Our solar system could have been a binary star system, meaning that we would have two suns. Besides hydrogen and helium, small amounts of methane, ammonia, phosphorus, water vapor, and various hydrocarbons have been found in Jupiter's atmosphere... The Galileo Spacecraft is powered by two different means, its thrust propellant, used for trajectory adjustments, and its main power supply for running instruments. The latter is 238Pu, or Plutonium-238. This 238Pu is what is known as a radioisotope, or radioactive isotope, which becomes physically hot from its own radioactive decay. This heat is converted into electricity by a thermoelectric converter. At time of takeoff the spacecraft contained more than 48 lbs. of Plutonium-238 dioxide fuel...."
Stay tuned and keep your eyes to the sky.

dude, it would suck if night was over at 3am, which is when jupiter rises

not to mention the whole extinction bit and all prolly

jupiter is 891 million km from earth
the sun is 148 million km from the earth

The sun is bigger than jupiter.

i think we'd be fine more or less, worse case scenario, it messes up all the planets orbits around the sun and we all die.

If this was, in fact, a plan by NASA I doubt it would at least theoretically cause extinction =P

It would speed up the process of making Mars an inhabitable planet.

or if it slings massive asteroids everywhere when it explodes and blows up earth, armageddon style.

Very interesting shit. Space baffles me.

It's mass would remain the same but its state would change. Gravity would not be affected for a long, long time.

If the sun turned into a black hole tonight, our orbit would not be effected. Its mass would remain the same but its size would shrink. Gravity follows the distance-squared law, and the distance between the subatomic pinpoint in space (the center of the sun which would in this scenario be the center of the black hold) and the rim where the circumference of the sun previously sat in space would generate the same amount of gravity.

We'd freeze to death, but we wouldn't get sucked in.

I doubt this really can happen with a mere 50lbs of plutonium (compared to the size of jupiter) but how f****d would shit be if it did happen?

compusmack wrote:

I doubt this really can happen with a mere 50lbs of plutonium (compared to the size of jupiter) but how f****d would shit be if it did happen?

The theory is that since Jupiter's atmosphere is made of hydrogen and all kinds of other yummy flamable shit it would create a chain reaction. If it happened theoretically things wouldn't be f****d up at all other than the fact the our days and nights would be different.

Ya, a catalyst doesn't need to be "huge." Just look at nuclear weapons.


Binary solar system. That would be weird as shit. Consider we would have lived in a time before the binary solar system - and no time after it, ever, would humans on earth live in a single-sun system again.

WEIRD MAN, WEIRD!

Ahh man.

How funny would that be if our space garbage was responsible for changeing life as we know it. Make us proceed a lot more carefully when ejecting crap into space.

Banzai wrote:

Ahh man. How funny would that be if our space garbage was responsible for changeing life as we know it. Make us proceed a lot more carefully when ejecting crap into space.

According to a book published 10 years ago this was calculated and planned by NASA in order to speed up the tereforming of Mars =P

Janothhhh wrote:

Banzai wrote: Ahh man. How funny would that be if our space garbage was responsible for changeing life as we know it. Make us proceed a lot more carefully when ejecting crap into space. According to a book published 10 years ago this was calculated and planned by NASA in order to speed up the tereforming of Mars =P

Hell of a gamble when you are talking about a furnace of a galactic scale. No real way to say "ooops" if it turns out poorly.

Haha very true. I just find it very... weird? That the guy who claims this claimed 10 years ago a dark spot would appear on the surface of Jupiter due to Gallelao(sp) crashing into it, and it would be planned by NASA to speed of tereforming of Mars... And it happened last week. No scientists have any clue what caused it, blah blah. Yeah, the guy sounds like a nutcase... But he predicted this would happen 10 years ago. You can't deny that a couple weeks after galleleo crashed into Jupiter a black dot appears, and no one knows wtf it is.

I'd have to learn more about the apparent reaction.

Granted I've not done my hoework on the compisition of the core and atmosphere of Jupiter but it seems to me the reaction of 50 lbs. might cause a minor event but would burn itself out before rendering an entire planet a fire ball. Aren't there trace amounts there anyway?

Just theorizing off the top of my head I'd have to guess that Jupiter, being mainly gas, would allow the core of plutonium to travel close to the core where the pruessure of the atmoshpers would crush the plutonium onto itself causeing the same reaction found in the relese of energy from an atomic bomb.

So you got a 50 lb atomic warhead that releses a gazzillion jules of energy that would then fuse hydrogen maybe? Is that the catistrophic reaction? If so wouldn't that happen super fast?

That's why I'm thinking this is all interesting but what's the reaction that takes this long?

Plutonium to energy then the energy dose what to what causeing what?

Never mind, reading the second article now.

Shit, I don't know man. I just find it odd that a decade ago some guy says NASA is planning on making this a Binary star system by crashing Galelao into Jupitar and causing it to become a second sun, then adding it will start with a small black dot that gets bigger. Well so far it crashed into Jupiter and there is a small black dot now. I havn't read anything that it's getting bigger.

Wouldn't the explosion cause the atmosphere to ignite? Then as it burned it would gradually expand, like a forest fire? Again, no f*****g clue. That would be some crazy shit though. Also, considering how far away it is, wouldn't that effect how quickly we see the changes happening?

http://www.badastronomy.com/bad/misc/jupiter_galileo.html

Another link about it.

but the satellite wouldn't have to just crash into jupiter. it would have to tear open and some chemical reaction shit would need to happen in order for all this to take place.

science in layman's terms rocks.