Endor’s Holocaust
The last film in the original trilogy, Star Wars VI: Return of the Jedi, celebrates the Rebel Alliance triumph over the Galactic Empire following the destruction of Death Star II. While, the Empire’s defeat is clearly a source of celebration; the event might also prove to be a catastrophic disaster for Endor.
“What happens when you detonate a spherical metal honeycomb over five hundred miles wide just above the atmosphere of a habitable world? Regardless of specifics, the world won’t remain habitable for long.”
-Curtis Saxton, Astrophysicist.
Popularly known as Endor’s Holocaust, fans have long theorised that the aftermath of Death Star II’s destruction leads to an extinction level event for the forest moon. In this matter, a number of scientists concurred with the theory.
Astrophysicist, Curtis Saxton highlighted that the slow orbit and the low altitude of the Death Star II point towards a device that would help keep its orbit steady, most likely a repulsor field from the shield generator on Endor or it might even be created within the Death Star II.
The Impact
He calculated that between 15 to 100 percent of Death Star’s mass would hit the surface of Endor with a speed of 80 kilometres per second. The majority of the shards would be a few kilometres long in size and its impact will result in ground quakes and craters, which would release dust and soot into the skies. Together with the smaller pieces that would enter the forest moon’s atmosphere as dust particles, it could block out the sun’s ray and have an adverse cooling effect on the planet; that could wipe out all life forms.
The Consequence
Planetary scientist, Dave Minton concurred with Saxton’s finding. He surmised that the 
debris from Death Star’s explosion would strike Endor at the speed of over 6,000mph and the fragments would leave behind a 700 km diameter. The crater would be almost four times larger than the Chicxulub crater in Mexico that is associated with the dinosaur extinction.
Given that Endor is 15 percent as massive as Earth, the impact would obliterate everything on the surface. No Ewok could withstand an impact of that magnitude. There is also the likely chance that Endor’s atmosphere would be heated up to the point that every body of water on the planet would turn into steam and its forest to ignite, setting the entire moon on fire. If scientific accuracy has been taken into account, the Star Wars franchise would have ended very differently.
