Comets
The first literate humans, living in Mesopotamian cities like Ur and Erech more than 5,000 years ago, seemed to believe that comets caused bad things to happen or, at the very least, they foretold that bad things would happen. Either way, they regarded a new comet in the evening sky as a portent of some future disaster.
Overhunting. Abrupt climate change. Disease.
Scientists have cited those and other theories in their decades-old debate about why mammoths, mastodons, sloths, saber-toothed cats, camels, horses and other large creatures disappeared from North America at the end of the last ice age.
Scientists have cited those and other theories in their decades-old debate about why mammoths, mastodons, sloths, saber-toothed cats, camels, horses and other large creatures disappeared from North America at the end of the last ice age.
Astronomer Eric Allen of Quebec's Observatoire du Cégep de Trois-Rivières combined images he captured on three consecutive nights (Oct. 25, 26 and 27) and placed them beside a picture of Jupiter scaled to the same distance as the comet:
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| Click on above photo for animation. |
War, rumors of war, corrupt governments run by psychopaths, phony terrorism, burgeoning police states...but is that all we have to worry about? What if there was something to put it all in context? Or rather, what if there is something else we are missing, something that is beyond the control of even the political and corporate elite; something that is driving them to attempt to herd the global population to an ever finer order of control...
A new sott.net video production:
SOTT's blog on Fireballs and Meteorites.
A new sott.net video production:
SOTT's blog on Fireballs and Meteorites.
A distant comet that was as faint as magnitude 18 on October 20th has suddenly brightened by a millionfold, altering the naked-eye appearance of the constellation Perseus.
This startling outburst of Comet Holmes (17P) may be even stronger than the one that occurred 115 years ago, in November 1892, when the comet was first spotted by English amateur Edwin Holmes.
This startling outburst of Comet Holmes (17P) may be even stronger than the one that occurred 115 years ago, in November 1892, when the comet was first spotted by English amateur Edwin Holmes.
A small and very faint comet has surprised observers around the world by overnight becoming bright enough to see with the unaided eye.
Comet Holmes, which was discovered in November 1892 by Edwin Holmes, in London England, was no brighter than magnitude 17 in mid-October - that's about 25,000 times fainter than the faintest star that can normally be seen without any optical aid. In order to view an object this faint, one would need a moderately large telescope.
Comet Holmes, which was discovered in November 1892 by Edwin Holmes, in London England, was no brighter than magnitude 17 in mid-October - that's about 25,000 times fainter than the faintest star that can normally be seen without any optical aid. In order to view an object this faint, one would need a moderately large telescope.
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| ©Space.com |
| Comet Holmes' location as of Oct. 24th at 8 p.m. local time from midnorthern latitudes. |
Did a comet kill the mammoths and destroy a civilization 12,900 years ago? S.C. site could provide evidence
The European Space Agency said its Solar and Heliospheric Observatory has sighted -- for the first time -- the third passage of a specific comet.
The space observatory, called SOHO -- a joint ESA project with the National Aeronautics and Space Administration -- has found more than 1,350 comets. But this is the first time it's found a rare type of comet called a periodic comet -- meaning it flies by the sun at regular intervals. While many SOHO-discovered comets are believed to be periodic, this is the first that's been officially declared as such, the ESA said.
The space observatory, called SOHO -- a joint ESA project with the National Aeronautics and Space Administration -- has found more than 1,350 comets. But this is the first time it's found a rare type of comet called a periodic comet -- meaning it flies by the sun at regular intervals. While many SOHO-discovered comets are believed to be periodic, this is the first that's been officially declared as such, the ESA said.
Goddard Space Flight Center - A NASA satellite has captured the first images of a collision between a comet and a solar hurricane. It is the first time scientists have witnessed such an event on another cosmic body. One of NASA's pair of Solar Terrestrial Relations Observatory satellites, known as STEREO, recorded the event April 20.
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| ©NASA |
| This is a still taken from a visualization showing Comet Encke and the coronal mass ejection erupting from the surface of the Sun. |
Comment: To find out more about comets and how often they actually collide with our planet, read: Forget About Global Warming: We're One Step From Extinction!
The Solar and Heliospheric Observatory (SOHO) has spotted an unusual comet that flies around the sun at regular intervals.
Dubbed P/2007 R5 (SOHO), the object belongs to a rare class of comets called periodic comets. Only 190 of the thousands of known comets are periodic. The most famous periodic comet is Halley's Comet, which can be seen from Earth every 76 years and last passed close to the sun in 1986.
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| ©Space.com |
Dubbed P/2007 R5 (SOHO), the object belongs to a rare class of comets called periodic comets. Only 190 of the thousands of known comets are periodic. The most famous periodic comet is Halley's Comet, which can be seen from Earth every 76 years and last passed close to the sun in 1986.
Comment: The fact that large scale cometary impacts have happened so relatively recently, and seem to happen in cycles, and are getting so much attention lately, makes one wonder if Something Wicked This Way Comes. Stronger telescopes or more asteroids and comets?
And what would cause these cycles? The paper can be read here. Figures and tables are here.