I was going to put this in another thread, but it didn't seem to fit anywhere else. The JPL Sentry close approach page has the only comet I've ever seen listed there.
It's 169P/NEAT (discovered in 2002), and the approach isn't really that close: 75.6 X Lunar distance (0.1943 AU) on Jan 12th, but it's a unique event in the last few years. There are currently 232 numbered periodic comets. Also a about 200 waiting for numbers, due to the quantity detected in the last half dozen years by the NEO search programs and SOHO.
Here's the SBDB Page if you want to look at the orbit and close appoaches:
http://ssd.jpl.nasa.gov/sbdb.cgi?sstr=1 ... ;cad=1#cad
Here's the current report on visibility:
Although CCD observers reported it as faint as 14-15 mag, it looks bright visually as 11.6 mag (Dec. 7, Chris Wyatt). Juan Jose Gonzalez reported it was significantly bright as 9.2 mag on Nov. 18. In the Southern Hemisphere, it keeps observable all through this apparition, although it becomes low in November and December. Especially, it will be observable in the excellent condition after January. In the Northern Hemisphere, it is not observable now. But it will appear in the morning sky at 14 mag in late January, then it keeps observable while fading gradually.
Date(TT) R.A. (2000) Decl. Delta r Elong. m1 Best Time(A, h)
Jan. 2 16 43.37 -68 38.4 0.222 0.856 49 11.2 5:37 (338,-24)
Jan. 9 12 45.53 -69 26.8 0.197 0.942 72 11.8 5:37 ( 0,-15)
from here:
http://www.aerith.net/comet/weekly/current.html
MW
It's 169P/NEAT (discovered in 2002), and the approach isn't really that close: 75.6 X Lunar distance (0.1943 AU) on Jan 12th, but it's a unique event in the last few years. There are currently 232 numbered periodic comets. Also a about 200 waiting for numbers, due to the quantity detected in the last half dozen years by the NEO search programs and SOHO.
Here's the SBDB Page if you want to look at the orbit and close appoaches:
http://ssd.jpl.nasa.gov/sbdb.cgi?sstr=1 ... ;cad=1#cad
Here's the current report on visibility:
Although CCD observers reported it as faint as 14-15 mag, it looks bright visually as 11.6 mag (Dec. 7, Chris Wyatt). Juan Jose Gonzalez reported it was significantly bright as 9.2 mag on Nov. 18. In the Southern Hemisphere, it keeps observable all through this apparition, although it becomes low in November and December. Especially, it will be observable in the excellent condition after January. In the Northern Hemisphere, it is not observable now. But it will appear in the morning sky at 14 mag in late January, then it keeps observable while fading gradually.
Date(TT) R.A. (2000) Decl. Delta r Elong. m1 Best Time(A, h)
Jan. 2 16 43.37 -68 38.4 0.222 0.856 49 11.2 5:37 (338,-24)
Jan. 9 12 45.53 -69 26.8 0.197 0.942 72 11.8 5:37 ( 0,-15)
from here:
http://www.aerith.net/comet/weekly/current.html
MW
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