Image of artist of a comet flying through the inner solar system.
NASA / SOFIA / Lynette Cook
An unnamed comet embarked on a daring but ultimately self-destructive mission because it was seen carefully on a collision course with the sun.
Images from the US Naval Research Laboratory (NRL) and NASA’s Solar and Heliospheric Observatory have the so-called sungrazer comet his namesake practicing close to approaching our star.
Comet approaching the Sun (from southwest, if lower right), while slow CMEs were on the order and west. The comet must now overlap with the sun disk if it had survived. pic.twitter.com/DH1ftnycr7
– Halo CME (@halocme) August 27, 2020
Calculations of the comet’s trajectory estimate that it would pass behind the sun at a distance of less than two sunbeams (865,000 miles over 1.4 million kilometers).
“This is not survivable for a small comet,” tweeted Karl Battams of the NRL and NASA’s Sungrazing Comets Project.
Our bright SOHO sungrazer still looks as healthy as can be hoped for! [📷: https://t.co/0lbmyfPeHV]
Perihelion estimates that it will be ~ 20: 58UT by 2020-08-27 ~ 15: 58UT (~ ~ 1.5 solar rays). This is not survivable for a small comet. ☀️☄️ pic.twitter.com/4ftuTFdOtn
– Karl Battams (@SungrazerComets) August 26, 2020
The close pass of the space snowball happened Thursday morning, and all indications are that it did not survive. Battams pointed out how quickly the comet disintegrated as he rode to our neighborhood star.
“The tail of the (the comet) is not your typical comet tail – it’s more of a boulder-strewn debris,” Battams wrote. “The comet is completely deconstructed by solar radiation in the most hostile environment of our solar system!”
The bright ones @esa/@NASASun SOHO comet has now been introduced to us @USNRL LASCO C2 camera.
That tail is not your typical comet tail – it’s more of a boulder-covered litter track. The comet is completely deconstructed by solar radiation in the most hostile environment of our solar system! ☀️ pic.twitter.com/OYeXvQBoiK
– Karl Battams (@SungrazerComets) August 27, 2020
Sungrazer comets are not uncommon, but this one was particularly bright and easy to see. Although we had little time to know it, it seems to have gone out into a sheen of glory.
