Huge comet appears near sun.

More information on Sungrazing comets
sungrazer.nrl.navy.mil...

Should be good to see how close it gets to the sun looks like it will pass the top or will the sun pull it in i do not know but interesting for me anyway not seen this sort of thing before.
spaceweather.com...

THANKYOU

Originally posted by schrodingers dog
Very interesting ...

Also, at the end of the video where the object appears from the bottom left, there's another object seemingly moving faster than "normal" at around 9-10 o'clock from left to right. I wonder what that is ...

As '___'omino replied I also think that the bright object to the right is Venus, due to its apparent brightness and direction of travel.
I also noticed the object to the upper left and I think that is Mercury. Both Venus and Mercury are in those same approximate locations (lower right and upper left) from Earth's perspective (or SOHO).
Inferring from the directions these objects (Venus and Mercury) are moving in the video I would say Venus is about to move in behind the Sun, Superior conjunction, and Mercury is moving between Earth and the Sun, Inferior conjunction.
Superior and Inferior Conjunction- Wiki

spaceports.blogspot.com... Apophis asteroid impact to earth also a threat! Either way we'd anticipate a severe communications interruption at the very least.

Hopefully it melts. Anychance this will come close to earth?

The picture shows something like a comet close to the sun. It could be billions of miles behind the sun. It's like the picture of the person holding the sun near sunset, which obviously means they are (not!). www.maniacworld.com/holding-the-sun.jpg

This photo does not mean a comet is 'close' to the sun.

reply to post by daggyz


I can't say for sure, but the fact that it comes into frame , ascends toward the sun, and as it gets closer to the sun the trail gets more noticeable leads me to believe that it is at least making gains toward the sun. I'm not astronomer though I can't say for sure!


also if you go to

sohodata.nascom.nasa.gov...

and select: LASCO C3 , res 1024, number 45 you will see in the most recent frames that there appears to be a very distinct line going through the "comet". I wonder if that is just a camera issue

You know most of the time when I see a sentence like

"Sun vs -X- I wonder who will win?!"

My bet is on the Sun.

I bet the Sun chews up more space debris then we could imagine, sort of a super bug zapper.

Very cool though OP, thanks

Originally posted by Helmkat
You know most of the time when I see a sentence like

"Sun vs -X- I wonder who will win?!"

My bet is on the Sun.

I bet the Sun chews up more space debris then we could imagine, sort of a super bug zapper.

Very cool though OP, thanks

what gets chewed up must come out some how though

I linked this earlier maybe it was missed

Hi all!

I was looking at the latest and noticed another slow mover.
Is this a satellite or another comet?

[atsimg]http://files.abovetopsecret.com/images/member/83123c86031f.jpg[/atsimg]

It is moving left to right.


It is easy to see from the current movie of the LASCO C3 here: sohowww.nascom.nasa.gov...

Cool shots w/ Venus in there too!

what does it mean 4 us??

reply to post by SLaPPiE


I believe elsewhere and I am going off their assertion, that the smaller object moving from left to right is Mercury. Do not take my word for it as I too am no astronomer.

Very interesting thread.

Does anybody know what the horizontal line accompanying Venus is?

Lens flare maybe?

reply to post by ownbestenemy


Mercury should move the same way like Venus - from right to left. Everything else could be a meteorite or a satellite ..

The little line crossing our comet is just glare in the camera , it will get stronger as the comet is approaching the Sun.

Still interesting to see if the comet will hit the sun . It will get interesting within the next 2-4 hours, stay tuned.

A nice source of information (pictures of the Sun) is here:

www.solarimg.org

Could this turn out to be a disaster for earth. what if it missed the sun and hit earth or hit the sun and caused a big explosion.

Yeah, what DOES this mean for us?

I'm not astronomer, but I'm assuming that if the comet-( Comet nuclei are themselves loose collections of ice, dust and small rocky particles) came too close to the sun, it would just melt like a snowball on a stove.

Or is it just the fact that it's an interesting phenom?

Because thats what I'm assuming.

reply to post by Romanian


Thank you for that information. If I am correct, the only time it would move in the opposite direction would be in retrograde correct? If Mercury retrogrades in relative to our position (or SOHOs rather).

Indeed it will get better as it comes into the view of the C2 camera.

I have a question. What is the faint blue object under the trail of light leading from Venus

I really don't think we have anything to worry about.

sungrazer.nrl.navy.mil...

Do the comets cause coronal mass ejections (CMEs) or flares?
It has been suggested that comets "hitting the Sun" cause solar flares and CMEs. Indeed, if you watch movies of many of our comets, you will see that they do indeed coincide with CMEs. However, there is no relationship between the two, and it is purely coincidence that we see this. Around the peak of the solar cycle, we often see ten or twenty CMEs per day, and on average SOHO discovers a new comet once every three days. So it is really no surprise that we frequently see the two occur at the same time. It is also important to keep in mind the sizes of the objects involved. The Sun is enormous, and SOHO comets are tiny (tens of meters). A few simple calculations can show that a SOHO comets striking the Sun is, dimensionally speaking, approximately the equivalent of a tennis ball striking Australia... and the tennis ball has the density of a soft scoop of ice cream and Australia is at least thousands of degrees Celcius! The tiny comets are of no significance to the Sun, and would plunge in completely unnoticed (and would likely evaporate long before reaching the surface anyway).

Positions of STEREO A and B for 2010-01-02 00:00 UT
stereo-ssc.nascom.nasa.gov...
[atsimg]http://files.abovetopsecret.com/images/member/601746f5bbff.gif[/atsimg]

reply to post by willis7737


You are right, it should melt . However, being close to the sun would make a lot of the component gases to evaporate , so this should provide a nice display (a very long bright tail, maybe visible with the naked eye ).

But - as someone mentioned, we actually do not know the position of the comet. It appears to be on track for a crash in the Sun, but .. who knows, maybe not?