Thursday, February 18, 2016



The Sun (or any star for that matter) is amazing. Every second it is losing 4 x 109 (4 billion) kilograms of mass as untold sets of four hydrogen nuclei are converted to a single helium one in the process of nuclear fusion.

That seems like a lot, until you consider that it is insignificant compared to the Sun's total mass of 2 x 1030 (or 2 nonillion) kilograms.

Still, it's nothing to sneeze at. Compare the follow amounts of energy of various events in megatons of TNT and Joules

Event Energy
(megatons) (joules)
1 Joule 0.00000000000000024 1
Energy consumption of New York City per second 0.0000012 5.00 x 109
Energy consumption of New York state per second 0.0000328 1.37 x 1011
Seymour Narrows, British Columbia 1958. 1,375 tons of chemical explosives. 0.001375 5.74 x 1012
Little Boy, the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima, Japan on August 6, 1945. 0.013 5.43 x 1013
Fat man, the atomic bomb dropped on Nagasaki, Japan on August 9, 1945. 0.02 8.36 x 1013
1 megaton 1 4.18 x 1015
1 pound of matter total conversion 9.75 4.07 x 1016
Tunguska Event, suspected comet impact in Tunguska, Russia on June 30, 1908. 10 4.18 x 1016
The Bravo test, (one of the Bikini Atoll bomb tests) February 1954
At 15 megatons, the most powerful bomb ever detonated by the United States--far bigger than expected.
15 6.27 x 1016
1 kilogram of matter total conversion 21.45 8.98 x 1016
Mount St. Helen eruption, May 18, 1980. 24 1.00 x 1017
Tsar Bomba, the largest nuclear weapon ever detonated 11:32 AM 30 October 1961 (Moscow Time) 50 2.09 x 1017
The third 1883 eruption of Krakatoa 150 6.27 x 1017
Hurricane Katrina hitting the U.S. Gulf Coast. (At full power, a hurricane like Katrina releases 10 megatons every 20 minutes.) 300 1.25 x 1018
World War III, computed as the simultaneous explosion of all known nuclear devices (about 15,000 today). 10,000 4.18 x 1019
Energy consumption of the US per year 9,327,500 3.90 x 1022
"Dinosaur Killer" Impact of 10-15 km asteroid traveling at 20 kilometers per second. 100,000,000 4.18 x 1023
Sun's energy per second 35,380,176,000 1.47 x 1026

Our Mr. Sun is quite the powerhouse. E=mc2  is a real advantage!

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