A comet with a mass of 7.75 1011 kg strikes Earth at a speed of 26 km/s.
a) Find the kinetic energy of the comet in joules.
b) Compare the work that is done by Earth in stopping the comet to the 4.2 1015 J of energy that were released by the largest nuclear weapon ever built by calculating how many of these bombs would be equivalent to the energy of the comet. Such a comet collision has been suggested as having caused the extinction of the dinosaurs.
bombs