Imagine that one day you receive a message on your phone like “Today our great sun retires”. So, you have no indication of impending doom. You panic and wonder, “What will happen now?”. Well only for the first eight and half minutes, nothing will change. As we know, light takes approximately eight minutes to reach our surface from the sun. So, we’d still see it in the sky for some time but then sudden plunge into darkness. Yes, the first thing you will notice is the darkness around the world.
Although, distant stars remain in the sky but apart from them, there won’t be any other natural source of light. Not even the silver moon.
According to Einstein’s theory of relativity suggests, after those initial eight and a half minutes Earth will start traveling in space at eighteen miles per second. And if we were lucky enough not to collide with other planets and asteroids or be absorbed by a black hole it would be moving in a straight line for the next forty-three thousand years before turning another star to orbit around.
But that would be rather a long time. The current circumstance on earth will continue to depreciate, and the next we will deponent is that without sunlight, photosynthesis would stop, so plants would no longer be able to produce life-sustaining oxygen. So, as no photosynthesis happens, CO2 levels rise higher than ever before. Fortunately, some giant trees with stores of natural sugar will remain alive for a little longer.
Later, within a week or so, it would be extremely cold without any source of heat, and the temperature would begin to go below zero which would put most living organisms on the verge of extinction, including humans. We would most likely get along fine without the sun for the first few months. Then within a couple of months, the ocean’s surface would freeze over, but due to the heat emitting from the earth’s core the ocean’s interior will remain liquid. So billions of years it wouldn’t completely freeze. Until one day we come close enough to a different star our beautiful green planet would be nothing but a sterile wasteland floating aimlessly through space.
So, shouldn’t we be thankful for the great sun for keeping everything in perfect order? Not only when you are in the shower, but also throughout your entire lifetime.
By Rtr. Sewmini Bhagya
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