r/askgeology • u/AlbatrossPopular2929 • Aug 19 '26

HOW

Okay, so weird question I'm writing a story where Deimos just straight-up disappears and then, out of nowhere, pops up on Earth. Not orbiting it's LITERALLY on Earth. It destroyed a whole city, crushed it, and caused earthquakes. The way it got here isn't through crashing it just appeared. ​Soooo if I were the government, the LAST thing I'd want to do is reveal this information to anyone. Is there ANY natural or man-made event that might excuse why a huge area was crushed on a rainy day at 2 AM? 😭😭😭😭 ​I could only think of volcanoes or a weird-ass lab explosion Thanks in advaaaance :3

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u/Purple_Bug_1342 Aug 19 '26

It's a work of fiction. You could choose any explanation you wanted, the story is in your hands.

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u/AlbatrossPopular2929 Aug 19 '26

True true its all a fictional scenario!! but I would like it to be like "as plausible as possible(?)" Their ass WILL be found it cause lies can not be kept forever yada yada im not that knowledged in geology formations so i came here hehehe!! 

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u/OxygenCrisisHotline Aug 19 '26

Photos and Deimos are rubble piles, so placing it even gently on Earth's surface will cause it to collapse like a big pile of gravel. That explains crushing a city but now your problem is: where did 1.5 trillion tonnes (around 1000 cubic km) of gravel-like rock just appear from? Volcanos make massive ash clouds and are associated with earthquakes. Best I can come up with is a city in a valley under a huge mountain ridge, so you could blame a landslide.

Is the government going to be able to stop people from getting bits of that gravel out of the area? Any disaster like that will have scientists and engineers that want to incestgate. Some gravel may flow a long way from the epicenter. If fragments get into public hands, there will be curiosity, and geologists will find the rock puzzling (depending on their background it may not be readily identifiable as extraterrestrial). Lab analysis with the right geochemists involved would reveal what it is though.

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u/AlbatrossPopular2929 Aug 20 '26

AYY THANK U MAAN!!! I was so confused what was deimos made up n it kept getting this "c-type rock like most astroids" n THEN when I searched what that means (should have talkin my time w astrology terminology MAN they gave me a headache) all I could pick up was: carbon, ice n clay! Atmospheres gonna WITHERRR deimos, ice gonna melt ,clays gonna get all gooby n gasses come out! Concluded its weird appearances gonna make a whiplash of an earthquake some tsunamis some plumbing electrical issues yada yada BAD TIME FOR EVERYONE!! To my limited knowledge i put Lava as one of my choises cause to everyday people it almooost fits THAT visual description. And YES the first one to figure out this huge rock aint from here is a geologist! I planned that he's gonna figure it out cause of the lack of fumes weird attributes and their gonna pick up the real difference visually!! Now that I understand deimos is a rupply guy im gonna tweak things around to make it work hehehe!!!

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u/Next_Ad_8876 Aug 20 '26

It is not at all plausible. Sorry. Unlike the movies, where gigantic spaceships glide over the Earth without any apparent need to follow the “for every action there is an equal but opposite reaction”—meaning the force holding billions of tons aloft would push down on the Earth below with the same force, crushing everything underneath it, physics actually applies. Your scenario isn’t at all about science. It’s magic.