Kamikaze Comet Heading for Demise, September 16, 2015

Kamikaze Comet Heading for Demise, September 16, 2015


Published on Sep 16, 2015

Kamikaze Comet Heading for Demise, September 16, 2015

A comet is plunging toward the sun today, Sept. 16th, and it is unlikely to survive the encounter.

The comet is vaporizing furiously. Will it make it around the sun? Probably not. 

Sundiving comets are more common than you might think. SOHO has found more than 3000 of them. Most are members of the Kreutz family. Kreutz sungrazers are fragments from the breakup of a single giant comet many centuries ago. They get their name from 19th century German astronomer Heinrich Kreutz, who studied them in detail. Kreutz fragments pass by the sun and disintegrate almost every day. Most, measuring less than a few meters across, are too small to see, but occasionally a bigger fragment like this one attracts attention.http://spaceweather.com/

These images were taken by the SOHO solar spacecraft
http://sohowww.nascom.nasa.gov/home.html