Science Buddies: "Ask an Expert"

Can a meteor strike a planet with enough force to change the speed of its rotation?

I would think it could if the meteor was big enough.

Better than that, *every* meteor changes the Earth's rotation, no matter how large or small the meteor is. Otherwise, there would be a violation of Conservation of Angular Momentum. The change is usually very small, and almost never noticeable, but it's always present.

See here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angular_mo ... r_momentum