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Keyword: cometatlas

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  • Astronomy Picture of the Day -

    09/26/2025 12:56:30 PM PDT · by MtnClimber · 4 replies
    NASA ^ | 26 Sep, 2025 | Image Credit & Copyright: Adam Block
    Explanation: A new visitor to the inner Solar System, comet C/2025 R2 (SWAN) sports a long ion tail extending diagonally across this almost 7 degree wide telescopic field of view recorded on September 21. A fainter fellow comet also making its inner Solar System debut, C/2025 K1 (ATLAS), can be spotted above and left of SWAN's greenish coma, just visible against the background sea of stars in the constellation Virgo. Both new comets were only discovered in 2025 and are joined in this celestial frame by ruddy planet Mars (bottom), a more familiar wanderer in planet Earth's night skies. The...
  • Watch Comet ATLAS (C/2024 S1) Get Destroyed By The Sun...Goodbye Halloween comet, we hardly knew you.

    10/30/2024 12:10:51 PM PDT · by Red Badger · 6 replies
    IFL Science ^ | October 30, 2024 | Dr. Alfredo Carpineti
    Little did the comet know that calamity was about to strike minutes after this snapshot was taken. Image credit: NASA/ESA/SOHO Many across the world have witnessed the spectacle of Comet Tsuchinshan-ATLAS. Some of us, due to constant clouds, were not so lucky. There was, however, hope for a second bright comet this year: Comet ATLAS (C/2024 S1). It was expected to get as bright as Venus by Halloween, but the Sun is a cruel mistress, making these objects bright but also capable of destroying them. That was the fate of this comet. It passed at its closest point by Earth...