If the sun suddenly disappeared, darkness as deep as a moonless night would descend on Earth a few minutes later. Our planet would also leave its orbit.

If the sun were to suddenly disappear, Earth would continue to orbit as normal for about eight and a half minutes—the time it takes for sunlight and the sun's gravitational influence to reach our planet. Once that period passed, Earth would be plunged into darkness and would immediately leave its orbit, traveling in a straight line through space at its current orbital speed of about 30 kilometers per second. 

This scenario is based on Einstein's theory of general relativity, which states that gravity propagates at the speed of light. The article also notes that the sun's massive gravitational pull is what keeps the planets in orbit, and without it, Earth would become an 'orphaned' planet, illuminated only by distant stars.

What would happen to Earth's orbit if the sun disappeared?

If the Sun were to suddenly disappear, when would the Earth leave its orbit? Albert Einstein was fascinated by gravity and how it functions. With a mass around 333,000 times that of Earth, the Sun dominates gravitational matters in our solar system. And many celestial bodies that make it up revolve around the Sun. Einstein described how gravity works in his theory of general relativity. It says that heavy objects warp spacetime. With its enormous mass, the Sun bends it so much that the planets begin to move in a curving orbit around it, just like the Moon does around the Earth. Einstein also showed that nothing can move faster than light. It rips through space at nearly 300,000 kilometers per second. According to the great physicist's theory, gravity propagates at the same speed. Researchers were able to prove this in 2015. After decades of trying, they were finally able to measure gravitational waves for the first time. Earth orbits the Sun at a distance of about 150 million kilometers. It takes just under eight and a half minutes for its light to reach our planet. So if the Sun were to suddenly disappear, we wouldn't know about it on Earth until about eight and a half minutes later. Then the sky would suddenly go as dark as the deepest night. Because gravity also travels at light speed, the Earth would also leave its orbit at that moment and begin whizzing through space at 30 kilometers a second, illuminated only by the light of distant stars. In the far future, who knows, maybe gravity from one of them would then pull in our orphaned planet.

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