By David A. J. Seargent
Have you heard the tale of the twister that lifted a man’s pockets correct from his pants pocket? What concerning the delusion of the Min-Min gentle in Australia? Do you could have a narrative approximately seeing the “Green Flash” or wish an evidence of the mysterious solar Dogs?
Weird climate: stories of Astronomical and Atmospheric Anomalies is set the unusual, strange, and inexplicable occasions that ensue within the air and sky. those comprise meteors that seem inside of a darkened apartment, ghost lighting that stick with lone tourists, lightning rising from patches of fog, and lots more and plenty extra. lots of those climatic brainteasers happen inside of Earth’s skies, yet there are parallel curiosities on different worlds, together with: lightning on Venus, methane spouts on Titan, thunderstorms two times the dimensions of Earth on Saturn, whirlwinds and mud storms on Mars , and auroras on Jupiter!
Just as surroundings and outer area usually are not separated by way of a pointy boundary, so the topic of this ebook isn't restricted to the skies. Earth is how it is due to its situation within the wider universe. bizarre climate: stories of Astronomical and Atmospheric Anomalies is should you are interested by the dazzling results of weather and climate on different worlds and our personal without end fasincating blue planet within the sun procedure.
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Extra resources for Weird Weather: Tales of Astronomical and Atmospheric Anomalies (Astronomers' Universe)
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This constant proximity to the plane undoubtedly helps in shielding the Solar System from too much radiation from the galactic core and also probably indicates that our system has experienced unusually few close encounters with stars and giant molecular clouds throughout its history. Taking up this latter point, it does indeed appear that the Sun has been cruising through an anomalously quiet region of space for the past several million years at least. We seem to be in a part of the galaxy unusually free of interstellar material.
The Sun is metal rich and so are the other stars for which planets have been confirmed. In fact, many are more metal rich than the Sun and it may well be that the stars which possess very large planets (which, in the main, are also the ones most likely to be found using present day techniques) are the ones that have a larger store of metals than our own Sun. That too seems to make good sense. But not all galaxies are suitable for the progressive building up of metal rich interstellar media and the continuing chemical evolution of stars.
But it is not a This Island Earth 27 A shield against the currently more dangerous asteroids. In fact the rather surprising conclusion reached by Horner and Jones is that the presence of Jupiter actually increases the impact rate of asteroids and short-period comets. Earth would experience fewer impacts from these bodies if Jupiter was absent or very small on the one hand or if it was twice its real mass on the other. Yet, if Jupiter had only grown to around the mass of Saturn, the situation would have been much worse, with an impact rate on Earth about twice that actually experienced.