Comet Holmes in Outburst (APOD 26 Oct 2007)
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Both a dust tail and ion tail are starting to show up in images. Presumably, the comet's distance from the Sun slowed their formation, and the very large and fast growing coma hid them from us until they grew long enough to finally become visible around the comet's edge.JohnD wrote:Many comets have two tails, one dust, the other plasma (?- electrically charged, anyway) that curves. If we can't see that curving tail, then Holmes doesn't have one. What does this tell us about Holmes?
Chris
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- orin stepanek
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This comet is interesting in several ways: We can't see the tail; It flared up suddenly: and it resides in the asteroid belt. Makes you wonder if there is a strong similarity between comets and asteroids. Maybe comets have more ice because: generally, they reside so far away and haven't had the solar encounters devoid them of their water content yet!
Orin
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Orin
Orin
Smile today; tomorrow's another day!
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comet collision ?
Doesn't take much of a collision to produce large clouds of material. Remember what a little bitty piece of copper did to tempel 1 ? I remember well the oooohhs and ahhhhhhs and awmygods...........I have read many comments that the chances of getting hit are very small and the jury is still out on what happened. Maybe a UFO gas tank blew up............................naw, sorry guys. back to serious stuff, pass the beer
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Wolf Kotenberg
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Plasma Tail Exists
It has a plasma tail. A number of amateurs have imaged it, including myself and my friend.
An amateur astroimager in the UK has captured a closeup of the head with a curving dark line, which looks for all the world like obscuring dust, across it. This could be a clue to what happened to cause it to brighten.
http://ukastroimaging.co.uk/forums/inde ... ic=33279.0
-Noel
An amateur astroimager in the UK has captured a closeup of the head with a curving dark line, which looks for all the world like obscuring dust, across it. This could be a clue to what happened to cause it to brighten.
http://ukastroimaging.co.uk/forums/inde ... ic=33279.0
-Noel
- orin stepanek
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tail
yahoooooooo the tail has a comet attached. I just found the pictorial of the orbit and it is way above the ecliptic. Assuming a lot of dust in the ecliptic plane, does that imply increased sunlight above ( or below ) the ecliptic ? It seems like this comet is reacting quite strongly despite the great distance from the sun.
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Re: tail
No, the amount of solar energy lost to dust absorption in the ecliptic plane is really tiny. Comets outside the orbit of Mars can produce dust trails, as long at the comet is active enough to be producing dust, as Holmes is. It probably had a tail within hours of its outburst, but it took a week before it stretched out enough to finally show since it's almost directly behind the comet.ta152h0 wrote:yahoooooooo the tail has a comet attached. I just found the pictorial of the orbit and it is way above the ecliptic. Assuming a lot of dust in the ecliptic plane, does that imply increased sunlight above ( or below ) the ecliptic ? It seems like this comet is reacting quite strongly despite the great distance from the sun.
Chris
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cometary activity
Is it not the case that the only mechanisms for cometary activity is sunlight light pressure and heat, collisions and close encounters with planets ?
Wolf Kotenberg
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Re: cometary activity
Depends what you mean by "activity". Certainly, all those things can influence the appearance of a comet. But by far the dominant mechanism for what is usually called activity is heat. First you need to boil off gas, which carries dust with it. Then the solar wind can sweep it away, producing the characteristic tail. Collisions and close encounters with planets may expose interior surfaces, allowing volatiles to escape easier. But I wouldn't say that of themselves they produce activity.ta152h0 wrote:Is it not the case that the only mechanisms for cometary activity is sunlight light pressure and heat, collisions and close encounters with planets ?
Chris
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by activity i mean
By activity I mean the difference between a rock serenely cruising thru space mostly unnoticed and a rock getting pulverised by other rocks while doing so, becoming noticed by us. Becoming noticed by us is the key concept here. Pass the beer
As our " eyes ' get better, this concept of " serenely cruising thru space unnoticed " becomes harder to do.
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Wolf Kotenberg
- JohnD
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YeeeeeeeeeeeeHA!orin stepanek wrote:The tail has come! :P http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap071105.html; Yah!
Orin
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I had to Google that - Revelations 12:1-17FieryIce wrote:... His tail swept down a third of the stars of heaven and threw
them to the earth.....
Ohhh I just couldn't resist.
see: http://www.westminsterstpauls.ca/church ... ?SER_ID=72
Or of course consult your Bible.
Fierce stuff!
But a reasonable description of a mighty comet!
John