Slashdot Mirror
Comet ISON Approaches Perihelion
New submitter BugNuker writes "Comet ISON has been speeding towards the sun, and while doing so, it has been getting brighter. There was hope that ISON would be 'Comet of the Century' material. That does not seem to be the case, but it still exists and it's still very interesting. Recently, ISON has undergone some outbursts, making it a near naked-eye object. ISON is still approaching perihelion (it will get there at 18:25 UTC on 28 November). For now, we can keep watching the STEREO spacecraft images for more evidence."
Emily Lakdawalla of the Planetary Society put together this animated GIF of the comet from images taken by the STEREO-A spacecraft. Karl Battams put together a fascinating GIF as well. The Planetary Society has a list of information feeds and scheduled events for keeping tabs on ISON.
"it will get there at 18:25 UTC on 28 November)"
Assuming it stays together that long
The NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO) will be providing near real-time images/movies at http://cometison.gsfc.nasa.gov/ on Nov 28 between 12:45 pm and 1:00 pm ET (1745 - 1900 UT)
I hold it, that a little rebellion, now and then, is a good thing. -- Thomas Jefferson
ISON is currently moving at 117 km/s! You can track ISON live here: http://theskylive.com/ison-tracker
Many theories have been going around about the breakup. This forums is a great place for info: http://groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/comets-ml/conversations/topics
Also, you can checkout real-time images of ISON as they are submitted here: http://spaceweathergallery.com/ison_gallery.html
Also, If interested, I've built a site with lots of ISON information. http://isontracker.com/ - Updates everyday
There was a UFO in the first animated GIF! It has to be Nephilum, the Mayans were right, and the apocalypse is coming!
Now that your conspiracy is satisfied carry on and enjoy the show!
-The wise argue that there are few absolutes, the fool argues that there are no probabilities.
lets try without poison this time!
Imagine being one of the people who read the e-mail address placed on error messages on the STEREO servers.
Then imagine that STEREO had a highly compressed near-real time data stream that was used for space weather forecasting. And that the files were replaced once the full-resolution data was downlinked and processed.
And, by working for the government, you have a duty to respond to requests for information from the public, even when they're being completely abusive in their messages.
I've probably spent weeks of my life responding to people trying to explain that no, NASA is not covering up evidence of UFOs, because we know what those items are-- compression artifacts, internal reflections, SEP hits, etc. (in this particular case, it's pixel bleed on the CCDs).
And there's no reason to view some GIF that someone made when you can just view a slideshow of the images directly. It'll let you speed up / slow down the images (once you've downloaded them). After that, it should move into the field of view of COR2A
Build it, and they will come^Hplain.
Boy or girl?
And stick to how Emily Lakdawalla is our nerd goddess?
Hale-Bopp from the top of a Welsh mountain with no light pollution for tens of miles around on the wekend it was at its' maximum was one the most awesome natural specatcles I've ever seen : it streched across the whole half of the sky it occupied and the movement around the head and out into the tail was clearly visible over time. As we've seen nothing yet with the naked eye and it might yet still burn up I'll opt for healthy skepticism right now. However if it does come up with the goods, try and make an effort to get yourself out of areas with light pollution if you can and see something you'll never forget.
I've never been much of a Twitter fan, but this feed has been excellent for links to timely information and discussion:
SungrazerComets on Twitter
When these astronomical events took place that the space geeks would just simply tell us "look there at this time". I get txt updates when the ISS is going to be visible where I live. They are so simple: time, date, travel direction, elevation. Is that so hard for the rest of the space geeks to do?
What is that second object in the two animated gifs? I assume ISON is the one going fastest left to right, but there is also one that has a downward trajectory (seen about when the vertical line appears in the first GIF).