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Comets

Comet C/1999 S4 (LINEAR)

Comets are icy bodies that orbit the Sun. They partially vaporize developing diffused tails of dust and gas when they get close to the Sun. Comets are usually composed of frozen water, carbon dioxide, methane and ammonia, in which dust and rocky material is embedded.

As a comet approaches the Sun, solar heating starts to vaporize the ices, releasing gas that forms a diffuse luminous sphere, called the coma around the comet nucleus.

Dust and gas leave the comet nucleus from jets on the side facing the Sun. Electronically charged ionized atoms are swept away directly by the solar wind magnetic field forming straight ion tails.

Small neutral dust particles get blown away from the comet by the Sun’s radiation pressure creating broad and flat dust tails.

Tails grow as a comet approaches the Sun and are always directed away from the Sun. Therefore, the tail is towards the back of the comet when it is moving towards the Sun. The tail is towards the side of the comet when it moving parallel to the Sun and the tail is towards the front of the comet when it moving away from the Sun.

For example, the animation of Comet C/2000 WM1 (LINEAR) shows the comet tail in the direction of the comet’s movement. These means the comet is moving away from the Sun.

The animation of Comet C/1999 S4 (LINEAR) shows the comet tail on side of the comet’s movement. These means the comet is almost moving parallel with the Sun at it closest distance to the Sun in the comet’s elliptical orbit.

Comets do not go zipping through the sky like meteors. They do noticeably move over short time spans of minutes to hours. Comet C/1999 S4 (LINEAR) showed movement in five minutes whereas comet Comet C/2000 WM1 (LINEAR) showed the same amout of movement in about a hour.

Orion Telescopes and Binoculars StarShoot Deep-Space CCD Color Imaging Camera
Comet 17P/Holmes taken on November 3, 2007
Nikon D70 Images
Comet 73P/Schwassmann-Wach taken on April 22, 2006
Comet 9P/Tempel 1 taken on July 3, 2005
Comet C/2004 Q2 (Machholz) taken on January 10, 2005
Comet C/2001 Q4 (Neat) taken on May 21, 2004
Comet C/2001 Q4 (Neat) and M44 taken on May 15, 2004
Comet C/2001 Q4 (Neat) taken on May 12, 2004
Comet C/2004 F4 (Bradfield) taken on May 1, 2004
Comet C/2004 F4 (Bradfield) taken on April 30, 2004
Comet C/2004 F4 (Bradfield) taken on April 29, 2004
Fastar CCD Images
Comet C/2000 WM1 (LINEAR) taken on November 17, 2001
Comet C/2000 WM1 (LINEAR) 2 image animation, taken on November 8, 2001
Comet C/2000 WM1 (LINEAR) 12 image animation, taken on November 8, 2001
Comet C/1999 T1 (McNaught-Hartley), taken on March 23, 2001
Comet C/1999 S4 (LINEAR) 2 image animation, taken on July 23, 2000
Comet C/1999 S4 (LINEAR) Image, taken on July 23, 2000
Comet information
Observable Comets