mrsMxyzptlk said:
What never made sense to me was how Nightfall passed between Earth and the Sun the way it did but was still on a collision course. The geometry just doesn't work. Maybe I'm not accounting properly for the Earth's gravitational pull on it, but it seems like the writers just didn't think it through. ::end rant::
You are correct, but it's even worse than that. If you look at the physics of casting a shadow, something as small as Nightfall can't cast a shadow more unless it's pretty much right on top of you.
I did a quick calculation. Based on a diameter of 17 miles across, to cast a shadow that reached the ground, Nightfall would have had to be less than 2000 miles away. If it was moving at 30,000 mph (as the script says) then it would have hit (or missed) the Earth approximately 4 minutes after everyone saw the shadow.
This is one of the reasons that Bev continuously tells me to stop analyzing the so-called science when we watch tv or movies.
Bob
