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Its probably possible, I mean when you have two things crossing paths there is always a chance they could colide, like pryo said. But the odds are very very small, They don't cross paths very often, but I am sure someone has probably figured out the odds, or at least tried.
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Can Pluto collide with Neptune? No.
A lot of people hear about Pluto coming closer to the Sun than Neptune and conclude that, when Neptune and Pluto are at exactly the same distance from the Sun, there must be a risk of collision. There are several reasons why this isn't actually so. The first is that it's a big solar system, and when you're out as far as Neptune and Pluto are, it's a really big solar system. As described above, Pluto crosses the orbit of Neptune twice every 248 years, so it doesn't often get the chance to collide; and even when it does cross the orbit of Neptune, the odds would be very good that Neptune would be someplace else. The second reason (which is the only one most books get around to mentioning) is that the orbits of the two planets don't intersect. You can think of the orbits of Neptune and Pluto as being like two links on a necklace; if Neptune ran in a circle inside one of the links, and Pluto ran in a circle inside the other link, they would pass each other from time to time, but they wouldn't collide. The third reason is a tricky one. Whenever Pluto comes closest to the Sun, Neptune is always ninety degrees away, either ahead of Pluto or behind Pluto. This guarantees that, when that "chance of collision" seems to occur, Neptune will very definitely be in a totally different part of the sky... in fact, it will usually be even farther from Pluto than the Earth is. Google and me = ![]() |
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No. Pluto orbits in a 3:2 orbital resonance with Neptune. Neptune always passes Pluto when they are almost farthest apart. Other information of interest: The search for Pluto was initiated because in the 1800's there was something farthur out that appeared to be causing a perturburation in Neptune's orbit. Pluto was found near the predicted region. Better more recent calculation have found that Neptune's mass was incorrectly calculated back then. There was nothing pertubating Neptune's orbit after all. Also, Pluto's mass was not enough to perturbate Neptune's orbit abyways. The time period when Pluto is closer to the sun than Neptune alternates between aproximately 13 years and 20 years. Pluto was closer to sun than Neptune from: = April 30, 1483 to July 23, 1503 = July 11, 1735 to September 15, 1749. = February 7, 1979 to February 11, 1999 Side and top views of Pluto and Neptune's orbits. Source: Pluto on Wikipedia ![]()
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