Incoming Comet that could be visible to the naked eye as it flies past Earth later this year may be doomed to disintegrate before we get a chance to see it up close, a new study suggests. Recent observations suggest that the comet has already begun to fragment and could break up completely in the next few weeks or months. However, some experts disagree.
Comet C/2023 A3, also known as Tsuchinshan-ATLAS, was first spotted by astronomers at the Purple Mountain Observatory in China on January 9, 2023, and it was confirmed on February 22 of the same year when NASA’s Asteroid Terrestrial Last Alert System (Asteroid Terrestrial -Impact Last Alert System ( ATLAS) noticed it heading towards the sun. The comet’s trajectory suggests this could be its first ever close approach sun and that he may eventually be kicked out of Solar System.
C/2023 A3 is due to reach its closest point to the Sun, or perihelion, on September 27 and could come closest to Earth on October 13, when it will be about 44 million miles (71 million kilometers) from our planet. If a comet wanders this close to Earth, it will be as bright as most stars in the night sky. it is possible for people to see it with the naked eye for several weeks.
But in the new study, uploaded on July 8 to the preprint server arXivauthor of the study Zdeněk Sekanina — an astronomer at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory who has studied comets for more than 50 years — says C/2023 A3 may end before it reaches perihelion.
“The comet has entered an advanced stage of fragmentation in which increasing amounts of dry, fractured refractory solids remain collected in dark, porous balls of exotic shape,” Sekanina wrote in the paper. These fragments will eventually become “undetectable as they gradually dissipate in space,” he added.
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Large comets normally fragment at perihelion as the Sun’s immense gravity pulls on the icy objects. That’s what happened to Comet ISON, which violently tore itself apart as it flew past the Sun in 2014. European Space Agency.
Scientists had previously assumed this would also happen to two other comets that recently passed by Earth: Comet Nishimura, which slingshot around the sun in September last year; and Comet 12P/Pons Brooks, also known as the “Devil’s Comet,” which survived the trip around the sun in April this year.
However, comets like C/2023 A3 can also fragment as they approach the Sun, as the increase in solar radiation puts pressure on previous breaks. This happened to comet C/2019 Y4, which spectacularly disintegrated into dozens of pieces before its close approach in 2020. NASA.
In the new paper, Sekanina claims that several lines of evidence point to “the inevitable collapse of C/2023 A3”.
First, the comet failed to brighten as it approaches the Sun like most other comets, meaning that its core or envelope may not be completely intact. Second, the comet’s dusty tail is much thinner than it should be and has a “peculiar orientation,” which also suggests that the comet is not in one piece. Third, the comet appears to be experiencing “non-gravitational acceleration” most likely caused by internal jets of gas pushing the core apart.
However, not everyone agrees with Sekanin’s observations.
“This doesn’t look like a fragmenting comet to me,” Nick Jamesan astronomer from the British Astronomical Association who was not involved in the study said Spaceweather.com. “Use [the word] ‘inevitable’ in any comet prediction may be unwise,” he added.
However, James noted that the new paper is “another good reason to observe this comet every chance you get.”