Things you probably didn't know about space:

So instead of doing a longer in-depth blog this week, I've decided to a bunch of "mini-blogs," to discuss some really cool astronomical things that don't really need a whole blog to explain :)

1) In space, if 2 pieces of metal will become permanently stuck together if they touch! (If they do not have any special coating on them...) This is because of the vacuum in space that exists because of the lack of oxygen... This is called "Cold Welding." On earth, the oxygen in our atmosphere prevents this from happening.

2) Earth almost has more than one moon! There are 4 other asteroids that are orbiting around the sun in exactly the same revolution period as earth... making it look like we're following each other! The first one was discovered in 1986 by Duncan Waldrom. People sometimes actually refer to this object, which was officially named Cruithne, as Earth's second moon. The image to the right shows the orbits of Earth and Cruithne.

3) It wouldn't actually be overly dangerous to fly through an asteroid field! This is because asteroids in asteroid fields are actually pretty far apart and most of them are very small. In our asteroid belt, there are hundreds of thousands of miles between the objects, and most of them are only about the size of a tennis ball... So despite all the cartoons we see that show us otherwise, flying through an asteroid belt would be a relatively safe endeavour.

4) Apparently the USA once planned on blowing up the moon with a nuclear weapon! No apparent reason for this, just to prove their superiority during the space race with Russia. The project was called "A Study of Lunar Research Flights" or Project A119. They wanted the general public to believe that the United States was doing better in the Space Race, but felt that shooting the moon (literally) would probably not go over too well with anyone...