In the past 2 months, Jupiter has been hit twice in succession, and the closest one to us happened a few days ago.
As the largest known planet in the solar system, Jupiter has played the most important role since the moment it was born. For example, in the early solar system, the number of planets in the solar system was at least hundreds, and the new orbit at that time was very unstable, and later under the action of Jupiter, a large number of planets were wiped out, and finally only the eight planets left today.
Of course, this is not the point, the real point is that the study believes that Jupiter is the "guardian" of the earth, because without the existence of Jupiter, it is likely that humans would have disappeared by the time of 1994.
So what exactly happened in 1994 that allowed Jupiter to protect Earth?
This happened in July 1994, when many people on Earth had witnessed this scene, which was also one of the most spectacular space events in the solar system, a comet called "Sumec-Levy 9", gravitationally affected by Jupiter, like a "moth to fire" and Jupiter came to a collision, and when this impact occurred, the power generated was equivalent to 40 trillion tons of tnt explosives exploded at the same time.
What is this concept? We all know that one atomic bomb is enough to destroy a big city, after all, in the 1940s, 2 cities in Japan were hit by atomic bombs.
And in 1994, the collision between Jupiter and the comet produced a power equivalent to 2 billion atomic bombs being detonated, and it is conceivable that if such a large energy is released on the earth, then it must be more serious than the fifth mass extinction.
Therefore, many researchers will say that if it were not for Jupiter, then humans would have disappeared in July 1994, because this comet that flew towards the interior of the solar system was attracted to the past when passing jupiter, and if it was not attracted, it would naturally fly all the way to Earth.
This time Jupiter suffered 2 consecutive impacts, and the situation was similar. And after research, scientists said that in fact, Jupiter often encounters various small objects, this is because Jupiter is too massive, so it produces a very strong gravitational force, will be most of the celestial bodies flying towards the interior of the solar system, are attracted to their own body.
From the current data, objects with a diameter of more than 45 meters will collide with Jupiter once every few months on average, and this time Jupiter has 2 consecutive impacts, which is still relatively rare.
This also makes some people worry that the number of small bodies in the solar system has increased, causing them to fly towards the solar system and try to attack the Earth, thus being intercepted by Jupiter on the way.
So, if Jupiter is hit twice in a row, will it be a bad sign?
In the solar system, in fact, there has always been a crisis, first of all, between Jupiter and Mars, there are asteroid belts, in addition, in the Kuiper belt of the solar system and further afield, there are also comet belts, hundreds of millions of small objects are scattered throughout them, many of which are threats to The Earth.
It is undeniable that Jupiter does play a role in protecting the Earth when many small bodies fly towards the interior of the solar system, but under the strong gravitational pull of Jupiter, in fact, it will also bring some disasters to the Earth.
For example, in 1770, there was a comet that would not have crashed into the earth, and when it flew over Jupiter, it was affected by jupiter's gravitational pull, causing its flight trajectory to change, which caused it to almost crash into the earth, so everything cannot be generalized.
So, what is a bad omen or coincidence that Jupiter has been hit frequently this time? At present, it is just a coincidence, after all, although there are many small bodies that are a threat to the earth, they will not hit the earth in the short term, and the probability of hitting the earth in the future will not be 100%.
Therefore, everyone does not have to worry, do not think that Jupiter has been hit one after another, it may not be long before the earth will encounter a comet impact, and even if there is a comet that really hits the earth, whether it can cause a devastating impact on the earth's organisms depends on the size of the comet.
Only asteroids with a diameter of more than 1 km will bring disaster when they are hit, and such asteroids are actually not common, on average, about 100 million years, they will hit the earth once, so we are still safe.
And with the development of human science and technology, today, many scientists are also trying to find ways to block asteroids in space, so that they can change their orbit before hitting the earth, so in the future, with the development of science and technology, the earth will become more and more secure.