Comet Lovejoy

A new comet was discovered by an Australian amateur astronomer: comet 2007 E2, aka "Lovejoy" (named not after the Reverend, but the discoverer, Terry Lovejoy). The Possum Observatory (John Drummond, in Gisborne, New Zealand) has a bit more information and a picture.

NASA has a simulation of the orbit of this comet, but I don't know how accurate it is at the moment. It seems to indicate that it will swing by relatively close to Earth (0.445 AU) on 25 April, although it will be over 1 AU away from the Sun at the time; I have no idea (and I don't think anyone does) of how bright it will be at the time. Judging by the fact that it is, right now, very close to its closest approach to the Sun (at 1.1 AU) and it is a 9th magnitude object (although with a somewhat long, if faint, tail), I wouldn't expect it to become a particularly interesting object visually.

Leave a comment

Recent Entries

  • 40 years ago...

    ...Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin and Michael Collins were inside the Apollo 11 spacecraft, on their way to the Moon. They would reach their destination on...

  • Forty years ago today...

    On 18 May 1969, Apollo 10 was launched from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida, the last mission in preparation for the Moon landing mission...

  • Launches

    This week will see, finally, the launch of space shuttle Atlantis carrying the astronauts for STS-125, the final Hubble servicing mission. This mission was delayed...

  • Carnivals...

    I missed on posting about it, but the Carnival of Space keeps on going, and we're getting closer and closer to the 100th edition! The...

  • The growth of the ISS

    Space Shuttle mission STS-119 has just landed back in Florida, after delivering the latest addition to the International Space Station. I thought this would be...

Close