Comet McNaught from SOHO

Images from SOHO's coronagraph LASCO C3. The comet appeared in the field of view at around 02:00 UT on 12th January 2007, it passes its perihelion around 19:00 UT on 12th January, and exits C3's field of view at roughly 03:00 UT on 16th January.

Current estimates place the brightness of the comet between mag -2 and mag -3. This means it will be brighter than comet NEAT or comet 96P/Machholz. In other words, this could be the brightest and most spectacular comet that SOHO has ever seen! Since LASCO was built to observe the faint solar corona, its exposure times are not tuned to handle objects as bright as this extraordinary comet. In fact, comet McNaught is so bright that it saturates the CCD camera so that "bleeding" occurs along pixel rows. There is a bright horizontal streak on either side of the comet's head, because the charge leaks easier along the direction in which the CCD image is read out by the associated electronics.

Category:

Science & Technology

Tags:

• Comet
• McNaught
• SOHO

[dontneed]

I thought that comet's tails always point away from the sun, no matter which way the comet is moving. In this video it doesn't seem to do that. why?

[BrunoTheQuestionable]

Yes, I've been trying to work that one out too !

I think its because the comet is so close to the Sun and its tangential velocity is so high.

[centaureghan]

@BrunoTheQuestionable too close? i think the inner circe must sun really the is miles from soho...also that would mean commet is bigger than sun!!! commets are ice so that one chunk of ice!!!

[Thyalwaysseek]

Whatever it was the Sun wasn't too bothered by it which makes me think that what is coming is a totally different beast. Peace.

[AeroheadLS]

@dontneed Dont think so 2 dimensionally. The tail is pointing more towards SOHO and away from the sun. It isnt supposed to be pointing off to the left.

[gunitfor]

so thier was another one in 2007 i thought this was the 2003 ones that nearly killed us' could it come back agian ?

[stupidkid1337]

@dontneed the FBI is preventing us from knowing OH NOES!!!!!

[miki87]

shit!!! almost as big as the sun!!

[tuckleyc]

No, comets have two types of tails - an ion tail and a dust tail, the ion tail does point away from the Sun at all times in the comet's orbit, whereas it's dust tail points in the opposite direction to the comet's velocity, i suspect the tail visible in this video is the dust tail.

[cjellwood]

these comets are huge. Any dick that say they are not is worse than the fools 500 years ago that bitched people into believeing the world was flat

[ptscao]

the comets tail is pointing away from the sun...its an illusion

[superhumanmind]

Hmm isnt it odd that this comet is FREAKING LARGE? Compared to the sun i mean.

Also it seems to move fairly quick in 3 days only.