NASA | SDO Sees Comet Lovejoy Survive Close Encounter with Sun

[anialiandr]

so did anyone from NASA say why it did not melt? Can our rockets go this close to the sun? If a pile of ice managed, maybe so can a rocket?

[12345hallam]

@anialiandr ice? lol.

[anialiandr]

@12345hallam Did the NASA not say that the comet was to melt as it was largely ice?

[12345hallam]

@anialiandr It's not just ice, at the centre is a pretty large rock.

[anialiandr]

@anialiandr ta; so is a planet, right?

[clincor94]

naruto music??!!

[thomasj120]

Look at my new chemtrail vid

[GreenMoversUSA]

Great video... I liked the music.

[distantlandmusic]

wow! kool!

[newdefsys]

wascally lil bandit ! Until we meet again, lovejoy.

[icannotfly]

pinbacker steered it off-course!

[TheScott2121]

Is it just me or dose this comet looks to be earth size ?

[dudemanicus17]

Why is the tail not facing away from the sun?

[TOWNSERS]

Why is Alnair #40Gru#41 shining so brightly in the night sky?... random question!

[EDitorialization]

Maybe it was really Destiny refueling.

[bahok123]

obviously god did that cos no one else can!

[lawfighter84]

hot...

[belmordok]

Lovejoy in the action!

watch?v=_HVIQ0S1iSI

--

Tribute to LOVEJOY Vocals by IAN McSHANE

watch?v=oK-N88cWEPs

[enoughzenough]

Seems like the comets trajectory has been altered, which orbit will it take now?

[SOFOKLES2012]

τα ματια μου , μου λενε , πως αυτο δεν ειναι σιγουρα κομητης!

my eyes and my logical wispering to my ears that this is not a comet!!!

why? take a carefull look the small turning that do that comet! this can not been done by a comet , but only by a mechanical system of steering!

[gsarjos]

@SOFOKLES2012 your viewing this as a time lapse , it is in fact the comet and traveling at speeds we can't comprehend

[adelente]

Sperms of the Sun...

[Sonicorchestra]

Hello

NASA does amazing work, good on (the collective) you.

Regards

Krzysztof Szychowski

[2721vovan]

Странно,хвост всё время сзади

[sarkerm2]

That's a badass comet! Passing by the sun while laughing and saying "Yo sun, your heat and gravity got nothing on me!" lol

[AluminumStudios]

Nature is so much more amazing and awe inspiring than anything man can dream up.

[caetanojulio]

Beautiful, beautiful and beautiful

[sushanalone]

God did it! wait..

[OARoyFokker]

Woah. Kinda reminds me of the scene from Star Trek IV, with the klingon Bird of Pray. Because of the way it looked like it was arcking around the sun.

Oops nwstraith said the same thing.

[royalspin]

Watch out- its the Annunaki mother-ship from Nibiru !!! (etc etc ..lol)

[Valendros]

Okay, that was amazing.

[ricimach]

Amazing video thank you..Rici!

[SOUTHCREEKSOUND]

Love Joy!!!!!! YEAH BABY!!! Setting it's controls for the heart of the Sun!!

[Anastrodamus]

HOw long apart were the side entrance and outbound surge on the other side?

[Platohagel]

I was actually looking for some indication of impact......is it possible? Would such a pebble\comet cause a ripple in that giant pond the sun if it had?

[endimion17]

@Platohagel Absolutely no. Compare the sizes of the Sun and the Earth, and then compare the Earth with an average comet (few km at most).

That'worse than throwing an amoeba into an olympic sized swimming pool.

[JabberCT]

I just had a astrogasm. :)

[A1R5N1P3R]

This is amazing. Everyone had this comet pegged a goner.

[MrPHAELAN]

@A1R5N1P3R did you just say that you got a boner?

[KD0IDB]

I can hardly imagine having the ability to view such a thing first-hand, wow.

[AgrivatedKillah]

NASA...when are you going to build a better propulsion system capable of inspiring Americans like you did in the 60's?-70's?

[Skaarjguy]

@AgrivatedKillah I know! if only they created a propulsion system capable of using accelerated ions to create thrust so that whatever craft is carrying it could slowly accelerate to ludicrous speeds like New Horizons did.

Oh wait.

[manabrau]

so if the comet spent about an hour going around one side of the sun to the other, near the surface of the sun, at a guess, it would had to have been moving at about 2 million km/hr, right?

[obaeyens]

@manabrau

1.265 million km/h (351 km/second) if its closest point was 120,000 km above the surface

[manabrau]

@obaeyens thanks for answering .. i did a rough calculation based on the video time stamps then I vaguely adjusted for the curved path it would have taken around the back. (i used a nearest approach of 140000km )

[obaeyens]

@manabrau

I used Astrograv for the comet simulation and I got 0.005497 Au from the centre of the Sun. (1 Au= 149,597,870,700 and Sun mass = 1.98891694291212×10^30 kg) (Wikipedia does not give accurate Sun masses) Then I got this speed at closest point: 568.1 km/s. (Using the wikipedia numbers I get 476.526 km/s). It appears that the fast speed made it stay less in the hot zone than Elenin because of the high eccentricity.

[manabrau]

@obaeyens nice :) .. 

[CattleCluj]

@obaeyens thank you for your information. At first i was thinking about huge measurement errors. I just couldnt belive how did Lovejoy get so close to the Sun and did not melt and Elenin did melt/disintegrated on it's perihelion when it supposed to be bigger than Lovejoy (they said Elenin had about 3-5 Km diameter whereas Lovejoy only has around 500m) and it had a bigger perihelion distance than Lovejoy. So it means that the high speed of Lovejoy decreased it's exposure to the hot Sun.

[obaeyens]

@CattleCluj

Well I would think. Smaller in size means less surface to expose to the heat and probably also less internal stress. Much higher speed and less time in the warm zone. But Elenin also got blasted by a CME. I don't know how much a CME can have an effect in a comet, since it is a thing fog, but it might have blown away the coma and also exposed the nucleus to the heat instead of a nucleus blocking the heat.

[pambatman]

wow

[fmahalem]

was the speed measured?

[nwstraith]

And that is how Kirk and company made it back in search of a humpback whale

[callofturdz4]

lol

[mundoovni]

WOW!

[TheStorozhuk]

))

[TheStorozhuk]

cool

[frazzz1170]

what is trailing behind it? smoke because of the sun burning it? or is it just dust

[1ownjoo2]

@frazzz1170

Since comets are mostly made of ice and rock, i would assume it was the vapor trail that comets typicly leave when getting closer to the sun