Whoa!
Our Solar System is plunging into chaos.
Better hang on tight.
The planets are getting
knocked out of orbit.
The Solar System’s planets
have remained in stable orbit
around the Sun
for billions of years.
And they’ll likely remain so
for at least another 100,000 years.
Thanks, Newton’s first law of motion.
But the forces that disturb this balance
could already be underway.
Like a giant rogue star
not bound to any galaxy.
Or a wandering black hole.
And bad news for us,
our Universe is littered
with agents of chaos,
ready to disrupt
our planetary neighborhood
at any moment.
Interstellar chaos reigns in outer space.
But back on Earth, it's not too different.
We're dealing with a triple threat
to our public health this season.
The flu, RSV and a resurgence of COVID-19.
Yeah, almost three years later,
and COVID is still here.
But you're not helpless in this fight.
And if you didn't know,
there's a new booster available,
and it's completely free.
You just have to be two months out
from your first vax shot or your last booster.
And this shot is the first to address the COVID variant
people are contracting now.
Look, variants of the virus will continue
to evolve and pop up, and that can't be stopped.
But the booster shots are our best chance
to fight off these threats.
Even if you feel like you're not at risk,
there are vulnerable groups who can't take chances with their health.
So don't put yourself or the people around you in danger.
Let's fight this virus together
and keep our planet on course.
It would all start with Neptune.
Neptune doesn’t need to be
knocked out of alignment
much for bad things to happen.
If this icy giant’s orbit changed
by even 0.1%,
it could trigger a series of events
that really mess things up.
With Neptune’s orbit in flux,
Iit would begin to influence
the orbits of its neighbors.
And sooner or later,
each planet’s disturbed orbit
would unleash total
chaos in our Solar System.
At first,
you wouldn’t see much from Earth.
Only astronomers would notice
the slightest changes in planetary orbits.
They’d be the first to know
that something really wrong
was about to happen.
These disturbances would build up,
and eventually they’d reach a tipping point.
Neptune’s changed orbit
would affect Uranus.
These two ice giants
would come dangerously close
to each other.
And then
they’d pluck Saturn out of its orbit.
This trio could be ejected
out of the Solar System entirely.
And none of the other planets
would be safe from this ensuing
cosmic pandemonium.
Because as Neptune,
Uranus and Saturn
were on the way
out of our planetary neighborhood,
they’d shove the biggest planet
in the Solar System
off its rails.
Jupiter.
Instead of revolving around the Sun
in an almost perfect circle,
Jupiter would now
have an erratic elliptical orbit.
Sometimes it would be closer,
and other times
it would be further away.
And this would impact
Earth’s orbit as well.
One peculiar effect would be
a new kind of global warming.
Our new orbit would result
in the coldest parts of the planet
reaching more pleasant temperatures.
As this celestial
domino effect continued,
Venus’ orbit would change too.
If it started to spend more time
further away from the Sun,
would there be any chance
that it could cool down enough
to become habitable?
Well, not exactly.
Venus’ scorching temperatures
run as high as 462 °C (864 °F).
And that’s not just because
of its proximity to the Sun.
It’s due to its runaway greenhouse effect.
Venus’ thick atmosphere already reflects
about 75% of any incoming radiation.
A relatively small
shift in its position
wouldn’t be enough to offset
the greenhouse gases
that keep it sweltering.
On the other hand,
Mercury wouldn’t be let off the hook
so easily.
A new orbit could lead
to a close encounter with the Sun.
And that could eject it
from the Solar System as well.
All these planets
being forced into new trajectories
could also lead to something
a little more dramatic than just
close encounters.
They could collide.
Yeah, Venus and Mercury
could slam into each other
and form a new planet.
Brace yourselves
for the possibility of a full-on collision
with Mars.
If that happened,
it would be bad news for you.
If Mars crashed into Earth,
there would be no way
you’d survive this impact.
And you’d have nowhere to run
from this doomsday scenario.
Now, should you be worried
about any of this?
Well, most flybys
close to our Solar System,
like a rogue star,
probably wouldn’t lead to such
a dramatic destabilization.
Anything we might consider
to be a threat only occurs
once every 100 billion years.
Though now that I think about it,
I wonder what it would be like
if a black hole with the power
to eat a rogue star
appeared in our Solar System
out of nowhere.
Well, that’s a story for another WHAT IF.