Astronomy Picture of the Day
Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation written by a professional astronomer.
2024 October 19
Image Credit & Copyright: Xingyang Cai
Explanation: These six panels follow daily apparitions of comet C/2023 A3 Tsuchinshan-ATLAS as it moved away from our fair planet during the past week. The images were taken with the same camera and lens at the indicated dates and locations from California, planet Earth. At far right on October 12 the visitor from the distant Oort cloud was near its closest approach, some 70 million kilometers (about 4 light-minutes) away. Its bright coma and long dust tail were close on the sky to the setting Sun but still easy to spot against a bright western horizon. Over the following days, the outbound comet steadily climbs above the ecliptic and north into the darker western evening sky, but begins to fade from view. Crossing the Earth's orbital plane around October 14, Tsuchinshan-ATLAS exhibits a noticeable antitail extended toward the western horizon. Higher in the evening sky at sunset by October 17 (far left) the comet has faded and reached a distance of around 77 million kilometers from planet Earth. Hopefully you enjoyed some of Tsuchinshan-ATLAS's bid to become the best comet of 2024. This comet's initial orbital period estimates were a mere 80,000 years, but in fact it may never return to the inner Solar System.
Tomorrow's picture: a simulated universe
Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
NASA Official: Amber Straughn Specific rights apply.
NASA Web Privacy Policy and Important Notices
A service of: ASD at NASA / GSFC,
NASA Science Activation
& Michigan Tech. U.
This is an automated email. If you notice any problems, just send me a note at gtracy@gmail.com. You can add and remove email addresses to this distribution list here, https://apodemail.org.Unsubscribe
No comments:
Post a Comment