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Could Earth fall off it's axis and out of it's orbit?
8 Answers
- ?Lv 78 years agoFavorite Answer
Both scenarios are unlikely in the extreme because the forces required wwould be enough to vaporize the entire planet.
Source(s): Newton's laws of mechanics. - Anonymous8 years ago
Fall? Like onto the invisible table it is spinning on? or the floor under that table?
What are you babbling about?
An orbit can be accurately said to be a "fall". Orbits are the way objects gravitationally bound together, but with angular (sideways) momentum, interact. Earth and the Sun both orbit the barycenter (their combined center of mass, which is a few kilometers from the Center of the Sun).
In fact there is a barycenter for the entire Solar System, all gravitationally bound masses orbit it, it is roughly just a bit above the surface of the Sun.
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The Earth is falling past the Sun. Its sideways speed means that that will continue for at least a few billion years. Below is a link that attempts to explain what an orbit is.
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So, unless and until perturbations change the current Solar System dynamics, no it isn't going to fall.
But the Sun is using up (and losing) its mass - So the Earth's orbit is gradually getting bigger. Once the Sun becomes a Red Giant, its atmosphere (the gasses that compose its outer layers) will slow the Earths orbit down, resulting in it falling into the Sun. That is the current best guess (but its a long long way in the future, and a lot can happen in a couple of billion years.)
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Tidal forces will eventually lock the Earth's spin to the Sun, only one side will face the Sun. I do not know how long this will take - if it takes more that a couple of billion years, then it won't happen, since Earth will be vaporized (see above). (It isn't an accident that we only see one face of the Moon, its tidally locked with Earth)
Source(s): http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Escape_velocity - Anonymous8 years ago
It could, but it would take a mass the size of the Earth at just the right distance and moving at just the right speed in just the right direction at just the right time.
There is nothing in our solar system that could do that.
- Anonymous8 years ago
Yes if a large enough object hit earth it could knock it off its axis
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- ?Lv 68 years ago
fall out of its orbit ?do you mean around the sun or around itself ?i am so confused
- cosmoLv 78 years ago
Well, technically yes. But the inner solar system has been non-chaotic for several billion years now, and is likely to stay that way.