Let’s talk about one of the wildest “what if” scenarios in the Star Wars universe: What if a Star Destroyer, one of those massive triangular ships, went full lightspeed and crashed straight through a planet?
It sounds like something out of a nightmare, but it’s worth diving into both Star Wars lore and real-world physics to get a sense of what would happen.
Spoiler alert: it wouldn’t be pretty.
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Star Wars Physics vs. Real Physics: How Would This Even Work?
In Star Wars, physics tends to bend around the needs of the plot. But if we’re combining Star Wars physics with real-world ideas, things get interesting fast.
Take the Expanded Universe (aka Legends).
One particularly grim story stands out: the destruction caused by the Quaestor, an ancient starship that went out of control and rammed into a planet.
This event fractured the planet to its core, devastating its entire ecosystem and civilization.
In real-world physics, this scenario gets even crazier.
Imagine a Star Destroyer moving at nearly the speed of light (let’s say 0.9999c, which is just shy of the speed limit).
The kinetic energy unleashed would be mind-blowing – about 1.35 billion megatons of TNT.
That’s not just a city-destroying explosion; we’re talking planet-wide destruction.
This energy would most likely melt the planet’s surface, eject trillions of tons of debris into space, and mess up the planet’s atmosphere for millions of years.
However, it wouldn’t blow the planet apart like the Death Star, more on that later.
Can’t the Planet’s Gravity Stop It?
In Star Wars, there’s something called a mass shadow, basically, it’s like an invisible gravity field that pulls ships out of hyperspace before they hit something big, like a planet.
Think of it as a safety feature built into hyperdrives. We’ve seen this in action with Thrawn using Interdictor cruisers to trap ships by creating artificial gravity wells.
In theory, this would prevent a lightspeed crash because the Star Destroyer would be yanked out of hyperspace before it could collide.
But, of course, Star Wars also loves to ignore its own rules when it suits the story.
The Holdo Maneuver from The Last Jedi (you know, the scene where Vice Admiral Holdo jumps the Raddus into lightspeed and tears through the Supremacy) threw these rules out the window.
This maneuver suggests that lightspeed ramming can work, but it’s an anomaly, not a standard military tactic.
You can even see the flip side of this in Rogue One, during the Battle of Scarif. Corvettes try to jump to hyperspace (at 7:51 of the video below).
One makes it, but the other collides with Vader’s ship without doing much damage.
So lightspeed ramming isn’t exactly reliable. It’s cool for the drama, but not something you’d plan a battle around.
The Energy Unleashed by a Lightspeed Impact
So, let’s dig into the numbers. A Star Destroyer is about 40 million tons, and if it hit a planet at lightspeed, it would release enough energy to mess up the planet beyond recognition.
We’re talking about an impact strong enough to vaporize all of Earth’s oceans and turn the surface into a sea of molten rock. Not fun.
The crater left behind would be enormous, and the impact would throw up so much debris that the atmosphere would be clogged with dust, blocking out sunlight and triggering a global cooling effect, kind of like what killed off the dinosaurs.
In short, it would be an extinction-level event, and the planet would be uninhabitable for millions of years.
But here’s where it gets interesting: this wouldn’t destroy the planet entirely, like the Death Star does.
That’s because it takes an unbelievable amount of energy to blow a planet apart, more than even a lightspeed Star Destroyer could generate.
So, while life on the planet would end, the planet itself would likely stay in one piece – just a very, very messed-up piece.
Why Star Wars Doesn’t Use Lightspeed Ramming
Now, if lightspeed ramming is so powerful, why don’t we see it more often in Star Wars? The simple answer is: it’s impractical.
While the Holdo Maneuver was visually stunning, it’s not a reliable or cost-effective tactic.
Most of the time, ships have to avoid crashing into things by using energy weapons that work from any range, and they don’t require throwing away entire starships just to make a point.
In fact, the Holdo Maneuver only worked because it was a one-in-a-million shot in the right situation.
In most cases, you’d be better off sticking with good old-fashioned firepower.
The Battle of Scarif proves this, as we see how a ship that collides at sublight speed does little damage to Vader’s fleet.