Anticipate The Approach Of A Comet That May Be Brighter Than The Stars In The Sky
Researchers revealed that the newly discovered comet C / 2023 A3 (Tsuchinshan-ATLAS) is getting closer and closer to the sun and our planet, and it can shine in the Earth's night sky more than many stars.
The comet's closest approach to the sun, or perihelion, will not be until September 28, 2024, before it reaches its closest point to Earth a few weeks later, on October 13.
Although the estimates are very approximate and tentative, astronomers expect a brightness of 0.7 at the comet's perihelion. Factoring in lower numbers on the magnitude scale, they represent brighter objects, with Betelgeuse in Orion at about 0.42, and Aqaba - the brightest star in Scorpius - being slightly dimmer at a touch over 1.
At its closest point to Earth, the comet can reach an even more impressive magnitude of -0.2, making it one of the brightest objects in the night sky. Add to this the effects of forward scattering, as the dust and ice of the comet reflect the light coming from the sun, and its strength can reach -5 magnitude.
It's also worth keeping in mind that the brightness of a comet is more diffuse than that of a star, so we're talking about a moving (potentially) tailed object, rather than a single light source.
The best times to watch C/2023 A3 should be in the days leading up to or after 13 October. It will appear in the dawn sky near the constellations Hydra and Crater.
C/2023 A3 was first detected by astronomers on January 9, 2023, from the Purple Mountain Observatory in China. It was then thought to have been lost before the team picked it up again with the Asteroid Terrestrial-Effect Last Alert System (ATLAS) telescope in South Africa, on February 22, 2023.
Besides its remarkable brightness, C/2023 A3 is moving particularly fast: about 180,610 miles or 290,664 kilometers per hour, rounding along an extended lap of the solar system, calculated to take about 80,660 years. At the moment, it is located somewhere between the orbits of Saturn and Jupiter.
Stargazers should start getting good views of the comet in June 2024, though there's a lot of guesswork involved here: These celestial bodies can be unpredictable in the way their trajectories evolve, and scientists know little about the comet's properties.
And while the odds are good that we'll see C/2023 A3 bright in the sky next year, there's not much in the way of comparable comet data on which to base the calculations. As such, astronomers can't say for sure whether this ancient ball of rock and ice will remain intact long enough to make an appointment with the sun.
Despite this uncertainty, the possibility is exciting for astronomers, and we may hear a lot about C/2023 A3 in the coming months.
Source : websites