Wednesday, June 15, 2016

planets - Collision of Phobos


Mars has two moons: Phobos and Deimos. Both are irregular and are believed to have been captured from the nearby asteroid belt.


Phobos always shows the same face to Mars because of tidal forces exerted by the planet on its satellite. These same forces causes Phobos to drift increasingly closer to Mars, a situation that will cause their collision in about 50 to 100 million years.


How I can calculate, given appropriate data, the estimated time at which Phobos will collide with Mars?




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