yego.me
💡 Stop wasting time. Read Youtube instead of watch. Download Chrome Extension

Touching a Meteor | StarTalk


2m read
·Nov 11, 2024

As far as science was concerned, I was completely hopeless. I mean, I remember, um, in my biology class, I was put in the front row. I hated being in the front row because, you know, you're in direct contact with the person who was teaching you. I would have an earphone in my ear; I had one of these first transistors because I'm very old. So, transistors sort of came out when I was young, radio, and it was smallish. I had the earphone, and I was listening to the tennis. In other words, I was not paying attention in class at all. But I was doing very badly.

But at prep school, I discovered a, um, meteorite as I was walking back from the games. Sadly, I didn't put it in my pocket; it was quite large. I was honest; I gave it to the Headmaster, and, um, it was sort of, I don't know where it went. It went to a museum or something, but I wish I had kept it. Isn't it just so you can relive the moment when you discovered a meteorite in the flower bed of your prep school many moons ago? I have a meteorite that you can touch, but you're not—I'm not going to hand it to you because I don't know what you're going to do with it.

“Well, I'll be very careful of it. I'll be very respectful! This is 4 and a half billion years old.”

“What? Whoa!”

“Well now, what—why I'm amazed by this—is this a part of a meteorite?”

“Yes, it is part. That—he's a good clever man here. You—you hired the right guy for your movie. This is part of a meteorite that was the size of that sphere of the Hayden sphere, most of which vaporized on impact with Earth. Fragments got strewn around, and the crater that was made by the parent of this is still around. You can find it in Arizona, and it's called Meteor Crater.”

“Have you analyzed this?”

“It's mostly iron—about 90% iron, 10% nickel—common in the kind of meteorite that this is. Now here's something to think about: once you feel that, imagine that just falling from the ceiling, oh, and hitting you in the head. Then your head is a pile of goo. Right? Now imagine something the size of that sphere, and it's going to make a crater a mile across. Now imagine something the size of Mount Everest moving at 10 miles per second, and you can judge how devastating that can be to our ecosystem.”

“Did it affect the tilt?”

“No, on that level, it's like a gnat flying into the buttocks of an elephant.”

“Right, right, right. I'm not flying into the butt—yeah, we had some elephants on our movie. One walked off set, actually.”

“Oh really? Okay, probably.”

“KN in the box.”

More Articles

View All
Africa’s Pristine Delta in 360 - Ep. 1 | The Okavango Experience
That first moment sitting by myself on an island in the Okavango Delta was the most profound moment of my life. It is, to me, a wilderness beyond comparison. The Okavango Delta is Africa’s last remaining pristine Witkin wilderness. It is an oasis in the m…
Suing Robinhood
What’s up, you guys? It’s Graham here. So as most of you know, I really like to keep this channel centered around personal finance and investing. But every now and then, something comes up that I think is worth talking about further, and today, it’s impor…
Shiba Inu Just Broke The Internet
What’s up, Dogecoin? It’s Shiba Inu here, and well, that was fast! Just a week ago, I covered my thoughts about the latest cryptocurrency seemingly overtaking the entire market, cannibalizing everything in its path, and quickly turning some people into mu…
Cattoos: How This Tattoo Artist Helps to Immortalize Beloved Pets | Short Film Showcase
[Music] My first cat tattoo was on my 18th birthday. Then came Patches, and then came a lot. [Music] More like a lot of teenagers, I suffered from depression. The best part about being a teenager, uh, was Patches because she was always there. I would wal…
Vortex Shedding - Smarter Every Day 23
[Engines screaming] Hey, it’s me, Destin. We’re at an airshow. So today I’m going to teach you about vortex shedding. [Music] Engines screaming YEAH! (Destin) Fly… flying our airplanes. Engine roaring I can’t hear you. Why does the smoke come out of the a…
Velocity, acceleration and distance traveled for points on wave
We are told a transverse wave travels to the right along a string. They draw it right over here. Two dots have been painted on the string in the diagrams below. Those dots are labeled P and Q, so that’s these dots here. The figure below shows a string at …