Isn’t ISON on an elliptical orbit, and due to enter the Sun’s gravitational field, causing it to whip back out into space in roughly the same direction it came from? If so, wouldn’t this gravitational whip action be unpredictable with a comet that was in pieces?
http://stereo-ssc.nascom.nasa.gov/comet_ison/
Looks to me like the comet will pass fairly close to Earth. What effect will splintering have with multiple pieces entering the Sun’s gravity at different angles?
To some degree, but unless a very large separation occurred, gravity differences between the pieces would be minor, increasing with distance from the sun of course. But the velocity needed to send pieces our way would be tremendous and require some kind of really massive explosion. The current track takes the comet and any debris from a breakup well above and in front of the earth. An unknown might be some kind of massive CME occurring at an opportune time knocking debris into a different trajectory - another highly unlikely possibility and one that would more likely only push pieces further away from the earth's path.
Any encounter with any exiting debris would be extremely remote; more likely we get a fantastic light show from it.
Sad to say, but I sure would like to hear some confirmation from the Russians! lol
I say this based on an observation of others were the original projected tract from NASA's models wasn't "exactly" accurate. The original model of the path I personally saw on JPL's small body simulator showed ISON coming in quite a bit above earth's orbital path. Now they're showing it intersecting it.
'Comet of the Century' Could Create New Meteor Shower
Just sayin'... ;-)