Added 1 new A* page:If you've been reading my posts in recent months, you know that comets fall into the Sun all the time--scientists have observed some 2000 comets taking their final fatal plunge sunward. Well, they've finally seen one take that plunge--and survive:
image by NASA (source)
^ That's Comet Lovejoy escaping from the Sun on December 15th. It was only just discovered--by an amateur Australian astronomer--on December 2nd, diving toward the Sun. Tracked by NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory, it was seen plunging toward what was sure to be its fiery death, only, a little while later, it was spotted racing away on the other side.
According to NASA's article, the class of comets to which Lovejoy is thought to have belonged--Kreutz Sungrazers, possibly the remains a single massive comet seen in 1106 AD--are usually about 10 meters across; Lovejoy looked about ten times that size when it was spotted, but now scientists are thinking that since it survived its solar flyby, it might have been significantly bigger--500 meters or so across. It'll have lost a lot of that mass in its close brush with the Sun, but boy, what a trooper.
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