This year’s much-hyped comet, ISON, may disintegrate before it gets close enough to the sun to put on a decent show. It’s currently losing more than 50,802 kilograms per minute even though it’s still as far as away as Jupiter. Irene Klotz takes up the story:

A recently discovered comet, dazzlingly bright even though it is still almost as far away as Jupiter, is racing toward a November rendezvous with the sun, officials say.

If it survives the encounter – and that’s a big if – the comet may be visible even in daylight in Earth’s skies at the end of the year.

Discovered by amateur astronomers in September 2012, Comet ISON is about to reach the outer edge of the asteroid belt, located 451 million kilometres from Earth, said William Cooke, lead scientist at NASA’s Meteoroid Environment Office at the Marshall Space Flight Centre in Huntsville, Alabama.

The comet is shedding dust from its nucleus at a rate of more than 50,802 kilograms per minute, the result of heating by the sun, observations from NASA’s Swift telescope show.

That level of activity is unusual for a comet still so far away from the sun. It could spell its doom.

Preliminary measurements made with the Hubble Space Telescope, which captured an image of the comet, indicate ISON’s body is no more than 6.4 kilometres in diameter.

The comet’s nucleus will continue to shrink as it flies closer toward the sun and heats up. The rock-and-ice object could break up completely before it gets as close as 1.1 million kilometres from the sun’s surface on November 28.

A comet in the 1970s passed 10 times farther away than that and partly disintegrated, Cooke said.

“I doubt this thing is going to survive. I guess we won’t know for sure until we look for it to come out from behind the sun,” he said.

The comet was named for the International Scientific Optical Network, or ISON, telescope that made its discovery.

Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/technology/sci-tech/hubble-telescope-spies-incoming-comet-ison-20130425-2ifwh.html#ixzz2RXAkZqHo

Sounds like a lot of weight to lose.

A fairly poor article. They don’t mention that the thing weighs about 2 × 10¹¹ kilograms, and at this rate of loss, after 6 months would weigh about 1.9 × 10¹¹ kilograms.

Of course the rate of weight loss will increase dramatically as it gets closer to the sun, but this rates nary a mention.

I think the implication is that this rate of weight loss so far from the sun indicates major structural collapse may occur before it gets a lot closer. They are quoting experts who don’t hold out much hope for its survival.

Yes, but it is a pop science article. It could at least give some semblance of information as to why they think it is not going to survive. They give a weight loss figure that sounds huge, and I suspect the majority of people would assume that is it. In fact, with the figures quoted it will only lose about 5% of its mass over the next six months.

Just maybe mentioning that the mass loss rate will increase substantially over the coming months wouldn’t have gone astray.

sibeen said:

Yes, but it is a pop science article. It could at least give some semblance of information as to why they think it is not going to survive. They give a weight loss figure that sounds huge, and I suspect the majority of people would assume that is it. In fact, with the figures quoted it will only lose about 5% of its mass over the next six months.

Just maybe mentioning that the mass loss rate will increase substantially over the coming months wouldn’t have gone astray.

I’m awaiting a clarification.

sibeen said:

Sounds like a lot of weight to lose.

A fairly poor article. They don’t mention that the thing weighs about 2 × 10¹¹ kilograms, and at this rate of loss, after 6 months would weigh about 1.9 × 10¹¹ kilograms.

Of course the rate of weight loss will increase dramatically as it gets closer to the sun, but this rates nary a mention.

I think you overestimate journalists.

https://www.facebook.com/PraiseBeToLordIson

From 26 Sep 2012
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/space/9567598/Coming-to-the-night-sky-the-comet-fifteen-times-brighter-than-the-moon.html

“It is currently very faint because it is out in the depths of space near Jupiter’s orbit. But it will steadily brighten over the coming months until it passes less than two million km from the Sun on November 28 2013. That makes it a type of comet called a sungrazer, and there is a risk that the comet – essentially a giant ball of rock and ice, will break up when it makes that close approach.”

Being a sungrazer – break-up is quite likely.

They say that breaking up is hard to do.