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Halley's Comet Imaged As Transneptunian Object

Posted by timothy on from the speck-among-speckles dept.

An anonymous reader writes "The European Space Observatory has imaged Halley's Comet at the farthest point (past Neptune) in which such a 10-kilometer diameter iceball has ever been observed. To image a comet as a raven-black object, without its bright dust tail (coma), is equivalent to seeing a lump of coal at the distance between the Earth's poles and to do so in the evening twilight. The last gasp seen from Halley's Comet was 1991, when a gigantic explosion happened, providing it with an expanding, extensive cloud of dust for several months. It is not known whether this event was caused by a collision with an unknown piece of rock or by internal processes (a last 'sigh' on the way out). Halley has an orbital period just over 76 years and will return in 2062."

7 of 139 comments (clear)

  1. In case of slashdotting... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    Here's the image, in case it gets /.'ed:

    . . . . . .
    . , . . . . (the 2nd one)
    . . . . . .

    1. Re:In case of slashdotting... by EvilTwinSkippy · · Score: 3, Funny

      It's morse code for "So long and thanks for all the fish."

      --
      "Learning is not compulsory... neither is survival."
      --Dr.W.Edwards Deming
  2. I'll take it up with Mark Twain... by toxic666 · · Score: 2, Funny

    and see if he is any more impressed than me. Perhaps he'll be more concerned about a 1 in 909,000 chance of an impact than he was about his odds of winning a frog jumping contest.

  3. The real reason for the telescope by KingRob · · Score: 3, Funny

    ESA's sekret plan is to point that baby at the Apollo landing site and prove once and for all, those lying Amerikanischer Schweinhund never made it to the moon!

  4. Sigh.... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

    Not even the editors RTFA.

  5. Re:Wrong by pork_spies · · Score: 2, Funny

    Yes, I realised after I'd posted that I'd just made a fool of myself. I did see Hailey's comet though - must have been winter 86? I remember showing to the gf, who was distinctly unimpressed.

  6. Re:I saw it last time by RobertB-DC · · Score: 3, Funny

    In the end, I got a look at Mars, it looked like this:

    .

    except it was pink.

    I'm happy to report that I was able to run your image through a high-tech image-enhancement system. To further aid in visualization, the edge definition has been increased as well.

    Here is the new image:

    o

    Hope this helps!

    --
    Stressed? Me? Of course not. Stress is what a rubber band feels before it breaks, silly.