If Earth had Saturn’s Rings
From an excellent post by Jason Davis
From Washington, D.C., the rings would only fill a portion of the sky, but appear striking nonetheless. Here, we see them at sunrise.
From Guatemala, only 14 degrees above the equator, the rings would begin to stretch across the horizon. Their reflected light would make the moon much brighter.
From Earth’s equator, Saturn’s rings would be viewed edge-on, appearing as a thin, bright line bisecting the sky.
At the March and September equinoxes, the Sun would be positioned directly over the rings, casting a dramatic shadow at the equator.
At midnight at the Tropic of Capricorn, which sits at 23 degrees south latitude, the Earth casts a shadow over the middle of the rings, while the outer portions remain lit.
via x
Sign my change.org petition to form a ring around the earth
Not that I don’t love change.org petitions, but…two things.
One: During the winter, day would become night and night would become day.
As you can see in the last picture, during the night, reflected light from the lit portions of the rings (the ones not in Earth’s shadow) would mean it would be basically as bright as a cloudy day, even at midnight. Also, during the day, the Sun would appear to dip below the rings, causing the day to darken to something a bit like dusk. It would look spectacular: the rings would form a luminous band from horizon to horizon, with diffraction and interference effects producing prismatic rainbows and optical illusions, but it would be basically like a second night. So during the winter, day would essentially turn into night and vice versa. It would be weird.
Two: The Earth is already going to get a ring.
(Probably). In the future (*really* far future), the moon will stop moving away from us, and start getting closer and closer. Eventually it will get so close that the effect of the Earth’s gravity will be stronger than the Moon’s gravitational pull on itself and the Moon will disintegrate. It will form a colossal ring around the Earth, much like Saturn’s:
