ARE WE MOVING AT A SPEED OF MORE THAN 2 MILLION K M PER HOUR ?

ARE WE MOVING AT THE RATE OF MORE THAN 2 MILLION K M PER HOUR ?

(Most of the information is collected from Google .com)

The answer to the above question is yes. It is confirmed by the cosmic background explorer satellite in 1989 and 1990. Accordingly our galaxy the Milky Way and its neighbors, the local group is moving at 600 k m per second or 1.34 million miles per hour (2.1 million k m per hour) in the direction of the constellation Hydra. Since the solar system is only a part of the galaxy Milky Way, we are also moving along with our galaxy. But we don’t feel the effect of the speed as we are attached to the planet Earth by gravity.

     The diameter of Milky Way galaxy is about 100000 light years. (One light year is the distance travelled by light in one year at the rate of 300000 k m per second). It contains about 200 billion stars as per latest available information. The Milky Way and Andromeda galaxies are approaching each other with a speed of 300000 miles per hour (130 k m per second). It takes about 5 billion years for their collision. They are likely to merge without causing damage to the individual stars and form a greater galaxy. The Andromeda galaxy is likely to contain about 300 billion stars. Milky Way moves through space within the cluster of galaxies it is a member of, and this cluster in turn moves through space towards yet another larger cluster of galaxies in the direction of the constellation Virgo with a speed of approximately 300 k m per second. Therefore the speed of the Milky Way galaxy is not a single number, its value is relative to the speed of other objects.

     Astronomers believe a huge concentration of matter in this direction. Some people call it ‘The Great Attractor’. Our galaxy contain the equivalent of 10^11 (10 to the power 11) solar masses. The Great Attractor is estimated to be on the scale of 10^17 solar masses, a million times heavier than the Milky Way. Its attraction is so strong that we are being sucked into it at the rate of 600 k m per second. The Great Attractor is something on the order of 150 million light years from earth. (One light year is 10^ 13 k m). It takes about 15 billion years to arrive at the center of The Great Attractor.  Since forces accelerate objects we will surely arrive there a few billion years earlier.

     The galaxies in our neighborhood are also rushing at a speed of nearly 1000 k m per second towards The Great Attractor, which has a span of 500 million light years and is made up of both visible matters along with the so called dark matter that we cannot see. The dark matter is neither dark nor black, but it is invisible as it cannot reflect light and cannot emit light, but it has got gravitational pull only.

     Besides the motion of our galaxy, Milky Way the Sun has got its motion round the center of galaxy.  It takes our Sun approximately 225 million years to make the trip around the galaxy, which is known as a galactic year. In all of recorded human history, we have barely moved in our long path around the Milky Way. The Sun has to move at an astounding speed of 483000 miles per hour (792000 k m per hour). The Earth anchored to the Sun by gravity follows along at the same fantastic speed. The Sun is almost a perfect sphere of diameter 846000 miles (1360000 k m) approximately. The Sun has about 99.9% mass of the entire solar system; balance of one tenths of 1% belongs to all planets, moons, asteroids, comets, meteors, and interplanetary dust and gas. More than a million Earth-sized planets can be packed inside the Sun. Rotation period of Sun around its axis is 24 Earth days and 16 hours. The age of the Sun is about 4600,000,000 years. Its surface temperature is 10,472 degrees F. Its temperature at the center is 27,000,000 degrees F. The Sun has 9 planets namely Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune and Pluto. (Pluto is now a day’s is not considered as a planet). Life exists only on the planet Earth as on today, not only in solar system but in the entire universe.

     In continuation of the above mentioned motions the planet Earth has its motion around the Sun. The full path of Earth around the Sun is about 600 million miles (970 million k m). The Earth moves around the Sun at a speed of 66000 miles per hour (107,000 k m per hour). The distance of Earth from the Sun is 93,000,000 miles (150,000,000 k m). Earth’s diameter across the equator is 7925 miles (12756 k m). Earth’s atmosphere contains about 78% Nitrogen, 21% oxygen. It has one moon. Length of a day on earth is 24 hours. Length of the year on Earth is 365 days and 6 hours.

     As seen above the planet Earth, where we, human beings are living is having so many speeds in the space. The maximum speed is that of our galaxy Milky Way. Hence we can conclude that we are moving in space at a speed of more than 2 million kilometers per hour, without even feeling the effect of that speed, as we are attached to the planet Earth by gravity.