Slashdot Mirror

I'm a historian, not a physicist or engineer. Even if I were, could somebody who made typewriters a century ago tell you how a petaflop supercomputer would work? FFS, exaflop supercomputers are expected in a decade. All I know is that Light Peak exists, and FTL EM research exists, and that suggests at least a reasonable potential for FTL optical computing.

This ignores that we can already make light (in the form of lasers and, astonishingly, radio) "faster than light" and that in such situations the time continuum seems to be disrupted and the light arrives before it leaves. We simply don't understand the rules of the game here fully. We know relativity while brilliant is an incomplete model (as theories tend to be), and as we grow to understand more about EM, quantum mechanics and vacuums I think we'll find that relativity is much like Newtonian physics, correct insofar as it goes, but ultimately deficient as holistic model.

By the way, it's worth noting that all FTL experiments have not required infinite time or energy, though EM is not matter.

    Well, if any of us pretend that we even have a clue of the contents of the rest of the infinite amount of space that there is, we're lying to ourselves.

    What's out there? Who knows. Wouldn't you want to find out?

    Asteroids made of solid platinum? Gold? Minerals we haven't even theorized exist yet? We already believe there's a planet size diamond out there (BPM 37093).

    A space presence doesn't necessarily mean people there. Something is a lot more than nothing. But, the day a starship comes into range of BPM 37093, and it's illuminated by another star, I want to be on the bridge watching.

    But as you say, all that's out there is nothingness and tiny specks of rock. It's good that you already know the contents of the rest of the universe. Now we don't have to explore it.

black holes do not absorb dark matter
http://www.universetoday.com/2010/03/22/astronomers-find-black-holes-do-not-absorb-dark-matter/#more-60422

So this would suggest the darkmatter particle has no mass, travels faster than light or both?

I skimmed their journal article on arxiv. At this stage all they've shown is that there is an upper limit to the amount of matter in the central region of a galaxy given that we don't see a "runaway accretion" (presumably the whole galaxy goggled up by the black hole?). They conclude this suggests that the centers of galaxies have constant density.

So they seem to be saying dark matter doesn't live there (or that there is a limit to it) and that is how it avoids being sucked into the black hole.

black holes do not absorb dark matter
http://www.universetoday.com/2010/03/22/astronomers-find-black-holes-do-not-absorb-dark-matter/#more-60422

So this would suggest the darkmatter particle has no mass, travels faster than light or both?

For pity sake

1) The matter in a black hole isn't missing. It's accounted for. We can't know what kind of matter is in there because we can't know anything about stuff beyond the event horizon

2) We still don't know what Dark matter is, but we know that the so called WIMP model is most likely to account for most of it. We know this due to studies of objects like the bullet cluster of galaxies which can't be explained by MACHOs. In the bullet cluster, you see 2 galaxies that have collided - the normal matter in the form of gas and dust in each galaxy got slowed down, but the dark matter passed through each other. That wouldn't happen with MACHOs, and we would expect to be able to detect MACHOs in such a matter rich area by their microlensing events.

http://www.universetoday.com/2010/03/01/what-can-the-dark-matter-be/
http://www.daviddarling.info/encyclopedia/D/darkmat.html

3) What's even more interesting is that recent work suggests black holes do not absorb dark matter
http://www.universetoday.com/2010/03/22/astronomers-find-black-holes-do-not-absorb-dark-matter/#more-60422

For pity sake

1) The matter in a black hole isn't missing. It's accounted for. We can't know what kind of matter is in there because we can't know anything about stuff beyond the event horizon

2) We still don't know what Dark matter is, but we know that the so called WIMP model is most likely to account for most of it. We know this due to studies of objects like the bullet cluster of galaxies which can't be explained by MACHOs. In the bullet cluster, you see 2 galaxies that have collided - the normal matter in the form of gas and dust in each galaxy got slowed down, but the dark matter passed through each other. That wouldn't happen with MACHOs, and we would expect to be able to detect MACHOs in such a matter rich area by their microlensing events.

http://www.universetoday.com/2010/03/01/what-can-the-dark-matter-be/
http://www.daviddarling.info/encyclopedia/D/darkmat.html

3) What's even more interesting is that recent work suggests black holes do not absorb dark matter
http://www.universetoday.com/2010/03/22/astronomers-find-black-holes-do-not-absorb-dark-matter/#more-60422

well I certainly am not a trajectory analyst or anything, but the guy next to me uses STK to do his analysis (the astrogator plugin). You could be right that they are using Titan to do a swingby, but I've seen some pretty crazy trajectories as a result of unstable orbits around Lagrange points. That is the basis of the space highway.

What makes you think that this is idea has sprung fully formed from Obama's forehead, without input from anybody else? Do you really think decisions are made like this? Also, please point out where I endorse the plan because Obama endorses it. As it is, 90% of your post is a giant straw man.

As for the rest of your arguments... I'll just point here as a start. That was 2008, and the problems have only gotten worse: http://www.universetoday.com/2008/04/03/report-constellation-program-has-serious-issues/

At closest approach it will be a first-magnitude star about as bright as Antares. from the wikipedia article link in the post. more about antares: http://www.universetoday.com/guide-to-space/stars/antares-star/

eh?

Every month several asteroids pass between the Earth and the moon that would be unpleasant, and we usually hear about it only afterward. These are typically solar system objects with relatively low relative speeds.

Sol is orbiting our galactic core on an orbit that is a few degrees off of the galactic ecliptic, and now and then her path crosses that of extrasolar objects on similar orbits slightly out of phase. Apparently the ELE cycle is in synch with this galactic traversal cycle rather than some solar system period. Extrasolar objects would hit with many times the kinetic energy per kilogram, by benefit of their much higher relative velocity. More importantly, we would see them once only and briefly. They don't live here - they're only passing through. Mapping their period is of no use.

And the cycle has an Extinction Level Event right about... now.

We need to lift the rear of the rover, or the left side of the rover, or both," said Ashley Stroupe, a rover driver at JPL. "Lifting the rear wheels out of their ruts by driving backward and slightly uphill will help. If necessary, we can try to lower the front right of the rover by attempting to drop the right-front wheel into a rut or dig it into a hole."

For those of us who were thinking about using the arm to move the rover,

They figured out that by pushing with the arm, only about 30 newtons of lateral force could be achieved, while a minimum of several hundreds of newtons would be needed to move the rover. Further, such a technique risks damaging the arm and preventing its use for high-priority science from a stationary rover. The other technique of re-sculpting the terrain and perhaps pushing a rock in front of or behind the left-front wheel was also assessed to be of little to no help and, again, risks the arm. There is also a large risk of accidentally pushing the rock into the open wheel and jamming it.

Mars rover has been stuck for almost a year now I happen to agree with you though, If it does get freed it should be able to produce a LOT more scientific data.

Thats pretty good guide I'd just add that there are some quality budget scopes out there. Celestron firstscope ($100) and the Galileoscope($20 though this excludes the tripod)

That said if I were buying for a young astronomer I'd get them binoculars. Because a) there compact and generate little bedroom clutter and b) they can be used for Terrestrial observation ;-)

Once we have decent space stations why would the moon be so important? (except as a spot to start a war with Earth ;) ).

You'd need very similar tech to keep humans alive sustainably on the moon and on space stations. It's easier and cheaper to develop those technologies in low orbit space stations near the earth than on the moon. Once you've done it, you move those space stations further out (the tech to do that would be required for space travel anyway).

Furthermore, it'll be much easier to do artificial gravity in space than on the moon, so that's a major plus for space stations. It's not certain that safe drugs will be found that will stop humans from having health problems due to low g environments. Better to do it the "physics" way.

Launching spacecraft from a space station in space would be cheaper than launching it from the moon. In space you can use a launcher with tethers. Not so simple to do that on the moon.

There are plenty of resources from asteroids. Scientists already are pretty sure there's water in some asteroids. In contrast it sure didn't seem as easy for them to find water on the moon[1] or mars.

The asteroids are further away so that's a problem. But once you can stay in space sustainably without dying (being able to grow/make food, recycle water, oxygen, radiation protection, energy source etc), the time it takes to get to the asteroids might be less of a problem - about a year (yes it's not trivial, but it won't be like those ridiculous suicide Mars missions they're talking about now).

Another thing, once you're already at the asteroid belt area, it could be cheaper to travel from one asteroid to another to mine different important resources (e.g. water and ore) than it would be to travel from one spot on Mars/Moon to another to do the same thing.

I suspect it would be cheaper and easier to move an entire mining and extraction facility/module from mine to mine, in space, than it would be on the Moon. On the moon, the oxygen rich rocks might not be close to the water rich places and so on. If you're planning to stay on the moon, you better do some good surveying and sampling to find a spot on the moon that has everything really close by. Otherwise extracting and transporting significant quantities of critical raw materials will be a problem.

[1] Compare:

http://www.cnn.com/2009/TECH/space/11/13/water.moon.nasa/index.html

"I'm here today to tell you that indeed, yes, we found water. And we didn't find just a little bit; we found a significant amount" -- about a dozen, two-gallon bucketfuls, he said, holding up several white plastic containers.

With: http://www.universetoday.com/2009/10/08/more-water-out-there-ice-found-on-asteroid/

Together, the two teams' findings reveal that the asteroid's entire surface is coated with frozen water, Campins says.

Landing large payloads on Mars is tough, if by landing you mean, at a reasonable G force.

"An airbag landing subjects the payload to forces between 10-20 G's." For a human, that's not a landing, that's a crash.

Parachutes are inefficient, especially for the last few hundred meters / second. The best solution for human sized crafts is probably parachutes plus rockets a la Viking.

I don't have a good solution, except that we should always land in Hellas (the deepest basin on Mars, with about 50% higher surface air density
than the mean surface), and plan on building a space elevator as soon as is possible.

But if the goal is to send people to space sustainably and for the long term, then NASA should be doing things like building and testing space stations that can spin and thus create artificial "gravity", and have decent radiation shielding. The long term goal should be creating space colonies, in _space_. Colonies where future generations of humans can live and reproduce. Thus the target would be developing technologies that would make it possible.

Not working on sending people to Mars or the Moon. Getting to the moon has already been done.

Getting people stuck on other gravity wells in the Solar System is silly and expensive. And talks of expensive, rushed (because of poor shielding and other issues), potentially one way trips to Mars are even more ridiculous.

What's so great about living on the Moon or Mars? It's not like they are human friendly places. What can you get from Mars or Moon that you can't get from asteroids?

There are plenty of asteroids to mine out there. Asteroids have a lot of water:

http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/050907_ceres_planet.html
http://www.universetoday.com/2009/10/08/more-water-out-there-ice-found-on-asteroid/

You might even be able to hollow out an asteroid and turn it into a space station.

Just because we're living on a decent planet doesn't mean that getting stuck on other gravity wells should be our goal. We should only get stuck in one if it's as good as Earth (or almost as good). And the other planets and moons in the Solar System are far from meeting that mark.

The plumes don't mix with the atmosphere, so the surface destruction rate must be much higher than the previous models (with 300 year residence times).

I don't buy it. Even if plumes indicate more methane than expected is produced, that doesn't mean the normal destruction rate is elevated as well. As I see it, the Martian atmosphere varies in a lot of ways. Temperature, pressure, and dust content all can change dramatically. Further, they're all correlated with each other *and* each, with the possible exception of pressure, contribute to the destruction of methane. For example, here's an article about the chemistry of dust clouds. They claim that you could actually get hydrogen peroxide, which readily reacts with methane, from the static electricy of the dust.

That sort of variable destruction would reduce the amount of methane needed to produce the plume, pretty much to whatever amount was actually observed. There's not enough information for anyone to say with some certainty what's going on. My concern here is simply that a mistake of three orders of magnitude seems unlikely.

I suspect you over estimate the amount of data being collected and how unsuitable some data may be for any other purpose.

Ignoring the obvious, that space is a huge space, you can hardly expect optical telescope sky scans used to detect, say, Kuiper belt objects in visible light to be suitable for detecting dark matter. Quasar signals won't be useful to detect the slight wobble induced by a planet in a star's motion.

Everywhere you look on this planet there are cameras and cell phones and radios, seismographs and weather stations.
We have telescopes, space stations, and radio survey webs.

Yet we missed the asteroid that passed on November 9th till it was only 15 hours away.
http://www.universetoday.com/2009/11/09/surprise-unknown-asteroid-buzzed-earth/

Just because you have data doesn't mean its useful for all purposes, or any other purpose that that for which it was collected.

They really needed it 250-300 million years ago though. Tweaking the impact velocity to get roughly the right values according to the article, the calculator reveals anyone on the edge of the crater would be vaporized, ripped to shreds from the pressure wave, then pulverized by the earthquake and drowned by a subsequent tsunami.

Now, THAT is what I call having a bad day.

Or at least the feeling that you really can walk through the rain without getting wet.

Depends on what it's raining. If it's raining rocks then you can...

If I'd left when I first heard this, I'd be about 1/3 way there, time-wise.

It's great news however how are we going to solve the population crisis when the Earth gets too small?

I always knew I was going to be 512 years old before I die. :]

One way trip to Mars... not actually a joke ;). http://www.universetoday.com/2008/03/04/a-one-way-one-person-mission-to-mars/

I'm referring to the surface temps in the northern polar region, that is (which is more suitable for colonization). Source: http://www.universetoday.com/guide-to-space/the-moon/temperature-of-the-moon/

It's not space, but you could probably, not without some difficulties, organize trips to this place instead as an alternative.

But you know people would volunteer nonetheless.

Yeah, and *none* of these being even remotely qualified or even sane enough for the job. Who's willing to throw his very existence away for a few weeks or months on Mars just has no idea what he's actually talking about and very probably has many other illusions as well. You're not really thinking that you can successfully train someone to do the year-long transfer flight to Mars just to die there? You'd risk that they would be *begging* to do just a fly-around and come back instead after they've been through this. Everyone sane enough to manage that task would be too sane to do a one-way mission.

These tough guys from the US army want to go on a one-way mission: http://www.universetoday.com/2008/05/26/one-way-mission-to-mars-us-soldiers-will-go/

That's really uninformed and outdated scare mongering. The soyuz spacecraft did NOT nearly burn up, it entered in a ballistic trajectory (i.e.without lift). This is uncomfortable, and undesirable as it is a backup emagency mode, which causes brief periods of high G and causes the craft to land off-course but is still safe. The problem was investigated, fixes determined, and recent soyuz launches work fine. Cites : http://www.spaceflightnow.com/station/exp16/080422descent.html http://www.universetoday.com/2008/04/24/soyuz-hard-landing-the-facts/ http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/09/23/nasa_says_soyuz_all_fixed_now/ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soyuz_TMA-13

Really reliable except for a series of Soyuz spacecraft that nearly burned up on reentry, due to the thrust unit not being released properly. They still have no idea what is causing it. See for example: http://www.universetoday.com/2008/04/20/soyuz-crew-safe-after-a-violent-re-entry-and-landing-400km-off-target/

Any landing you can walk away from is a success, and the crew survived, didn't they? How would a shuttle deal with this sort of punishment, you think?

If given a choice to travel on either a Soyuz or a shuttle, I'd fly on a Soyuz in a heartbeat. Not that anyone will ever ask me of course...

Really reliable except for a series of Soyuz spacecraft that nearly burned up on reentry, due to the thrust unit not being released properly. They still have no idea what is causing it. See for example: http://www.universetoday.com/2008/04/20/soyuz-crew-safe-after-a-violent-re-entry-and-landing-400km-off-target/

It rotates, very slowly
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Venus
http://www.universetoday.com/guide-to-space/venus/how-long-is-a-day-on-venus/
http://nineplanets.org/venus.html
http://www.doub.net/Enseignement/VRML/Exemples/CyberAstronomy/Venus/HTML/index.html
http://hypertextbook.com/facts/1999/JessicaBrodkin.shtml

How is this new news? WhiteKnightTwo was unveiled a year ago. http://www.universetoday.com/2008/07/28/virgin-galactics-whiteknighttwo-sees-sunlight-for-the-first-time-gallery/

http://www.universetoday.com/2009/07/19/possible-new-impact-on-jupiter/

sorry to go off topic, but the only purpose of manned space exploration is political gain. the same scientific results can be obtained at a fraction of the cost using robotic missions.

Some day perhaps, but at the moment we still don't have any robot that's as mobile or creative as a human.

when it comes to mars, it's more like 200 days for a fuel conserving path.

I don't think we'll be that eager to conserve fuel when we're sending humans. It's a trade-off between how much space they're gonna have, and how long they're gonna stay cooped up in that space.

In any case, Valeri Polyakov has spent over 400 continuous days in Mir, which definitely counts as very cramped.

jupiter? cassini took 7 years.

That's nice, but I'm not talking about Jupiter, but about Mars, which is quite a bit closer.

the logistics of keeping 1 or more people alive, fed, and not insane for 400+ days (round trip) is unimaginable to me considering the current state of our technology.

Unless you're a leading rocket scientist, what's unimaginable to you is hardly relevant, is it? Read Zubrin's, proposal. He deals with exactly those logistics.

Basically, the Mars base, return vehicle and food are going to be sent on an unmanned fuel-conserving path, and only once we're sure everything is in place, are the humans sent on a much faster path. It takes a bit of fuel, but they don't have to bring food, fuel or equipment for the stay on Mars or the return trip. That makes quite a lot of difference.

Sending people to Mars would be something completely new. It's an accomplishment on the scale of putting the first people on the moon. And people on Mars would be able to investigate things that all those Mars rovers never can.

sorry to go off topic, but the only purpose of manned space exploration is political gain. the same scientific results can be obtained at a fraction of the cost using robotic missions.

moreover, there's a point where the concept of a manned mission just becomes impractical. lock a few people in cramped capsule for 3 days? not so bad. when it comes to mars, it's more like 200 days for a fuel conserving path. jupiter? cassini took 7 years. the logistics of keeping 1 or more people alive, fed, and not insane for 400+ days (round trip) is unimaginable to me considering the current state of our technology. when it comes to anything beyond mars, well just forget it. it's robotics or nothing.

From universe today:

Past Climate Change Cannot Be Tied to Earth Passing Through Galactic Plane
http://www.universetoday.com/2009/06/26/past-climate-change-cannot-be-tied-to-earth-passing-through-galactic-plane/

If you mean the experiment at Dan Lathrop's Nonlinear Dynamics Lab, they are doing succesive experiments with bigger and bigger spheres. Last was with a 60cm one, and now they are working on the 3m version which is the one with 13.5 tons of sodium as you mention. According to their webpage:

The three meter experiment now spins under motor control--watch our YouTube movie! We are debugging the system with water as a test fluid, and will soon make Lagrangian flow measurements in collaboration with colleagues from the group of J. F. Pinton. Sodium experiments will follow. More...

There is an article about them from 2008 at Universe Today, and also other people in France were doing spinning sodium experiments in 2007.

Researchers did an experiment simulating the temperature and pressure conditions on Mars, and found that liquid water is possible because of the perchlorates Phoenix found on the soil.
http://www.universetoday.com/2009/05/26/more-researchers-say-liquid-water-present-on-mars-now/

Yeah, although I can't find it on slashdot, here is a similar article: http://www.universetoday.com/2009/04/03/warp-drives-probably-impossible-after-all/

I think it's strange that there's not more talk about sending a probe to Alpha Centauri, even if it would take many generations to arrive. Just to get videos and measurements sent back from there would be an amazing accomplishment, and probably would lead to advancements in our understanding of the universe.

Here is a good article I found about how long it might take.

I have an alternate idea for interstellar propulsion. I'm sure I'm not the first to think of it, but I've yet to see it discussed anywhere.

The idea is to latch on to a nice sized comet/asteroid which is headed in more or less the desired direction of travel. The lander would consist of a nuclear reactor power source, some sort of rail gun or mass cannon, and a couple of mining robots. The robots would slowly eat away at the asteroid, mashing up its mass into little balls or packets. These packets would then be shot off at regular intervals at insanely high velocities, each time causing the craft to accelerate.

About 2/3's of the asteroid mass would be used to get up to speed. This would be followed by a time of cruising. Then finally, the last third of the mass would be shot forward to decelerate the craft as the destination neared.

I think this has potential for extremely high speeds, much more that what is practical with conventional rockets. The nuclear reactor provides gobs of power, and the mass of the space rock provides a way to use that power productively.

Reminds me of Mars.

It takes at least two to collaborate and Russia has made it clear they want a free ride.

Who's riding who's spaceships into orbit?

When the Shuttle stops running, the Russkies will be our only ride into space.

Unfortunately, holding onto the fuel tank spelled certain doom; it is doubtful he would have been able to remain attached as the violent shaking and g-forces took hold. Although he made it as high as the launch tower, it is likely the bat dropped off and died in the searing 1400C exhaust of the throttling boosters.

The bat has been named Brian.

The presence of methane on Mars is considered a strong indicator of some form of current life there.

http://www.universetoday.com/2004/03/30/whats-creating-the-methane-life-or-volcanoes/

While there are natural processes that can produce it, it decays quickly and so it is more likely that an organism is providing consistent replenishment.

However, I don't think anyone expects that Pluto would be able to support life--too too cold. Is there some explanation for natural forming, and natural persisting, on Pluto that makes sense that does not imply the presence of life?

According to the following link, life started on earth 3.8 billion years ago:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_evolution

According to the following link our solar system is about 4.6 billion years old:

http://www.universetoday.com/guide-to-space/the-solar-system/how-old-is-the-solar-system/

So... this gives Mars approximately 600 million years to come up with "some" form of life before its magnetosphere stopped working (because after that, the environment probably became very inhospitable). Considering it took earth 2.2 billion years to create life...

By my math, 4.6e9 - 3.2e9 = 0.8 billion years for life to appear on Earth.

we are gambling that Mars had life sooner than Earth?

Would it even be possible for a planet to have life on it within 500 million years of its creation? From what I understand, Earth was awfully uninhabitable to life in its first billion years (fire and brimstone kinda stuff, Venus like). Why would Mars be any different?

First, the Moon was formed 4.5e9 years ago; that event presumably reheated the Earth's crust, so it's more accurate to say that life took 0.7e9 years to appear. Also, since Mars is much smaller than the Earth, it would cool more quickly, reaching temperature conducive to life faster than the Earth. Combining those two fact, 600 million years seems quite reasonable.

Ok, I'll bite.

Someone else pointed out this site, I'll post the link and pull some references from it:

http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2001/ast31jan_1.htm

Where did it go?

"New evidence from NASA's Mars Global Surveyor (MGS) spacecraft supports a long-held suspicion that much of the Red Planet's atmosphere was simply blown away -- by the solar wind."

So... according to NASA, Mars has been screwed for about 4 billion years:

"How do scientists know when the dynamo turned off? "Mars has been kind to us," explains Mitchell. "There are two large impact basins, Hellas and Argyre, about four billion years old that are demagnetized. If the dynamo was still operating when those impact features formed, the crust would have re-magnetized as they cooled. The dynamo must have stopped before then.""

According to the following link, life started on earth 3.8 billion years ago:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_evolution

According to the following link our solar system is about 4.6 billion years old:

http://www.universetoday.com/guide-to-space/the-solar-system/how-old-is-the-solar-system/

So... this gives Mars approximately 600 million years to come up with "some" form of life before its magnetosphere stopped working (because after that, the environment probably became very inhospitable). Considering it took earth 2.2 billion years to create life... we are gambling that Mars had life sooner than Earth?

Would it even be possible for a planet to have life on it within 500 million years of its creation? From what I understand, Earth was awfully uninhabitable to life in its first billion years (fire and brimstone kinda stuff, Venus like). Why would Mars be any different?

well, might be tought to work in an environment full of moon dust, as it has been found to be extremevly abrasive and potentially very dangerous for humans.

If you were to hit anything on the way.. bad stuff!

I remembered reading a story about british scientests creating an energy shield that would be able to deflect charged solar particles away from a ship, however the atricle says that these are early results that they have obtained and would be quite a ways away from creating anything viable for use on a space shuttle/ship. Now I wonder if they would be able to modify this application in some way to deflect objects bigger than charged particles. Only time will tell i guess, anywho here is the link to the article about the british scientests:

http://www.universetoday.com/2008/01/27/scientists-design-ion-shield-to-protect-astronauts-from-solar-wind-radiation/

Now I do recall another article (it may have even been on /. about scientest that had actually created a "shield" that could cloak an object the size of a toaster from radar, and in theory they speculated that if they were able to "significantly" increase the power output to the "shield", then it may be possible to deflect larger objects and even energy based weapons... however i cannot find the old link to that story.

Take a look at this image and tell me the problem is really that much worse.

As sibling comment says, it was 789km.

A 950kg object struck a 560kg object at 11.7km/s (see hypervelocity). All the pieces have new orbits.

Here's some pretty pretty animation.