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some comets like it hot presented by

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science at NASA

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comets are icy and fragile they spend

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most of their time orbiting thru the

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dark outskirts of the solar system safe

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from the withering depredations of

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intense sunlight their natural habitat

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is the deepest cold last November

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amateur astronomer Terry Lovejoy

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discovered a different kind of comet the

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icy fuzzball he spotted in the sky over

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his backyard Observatory in Australia

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was heading almost directly for the Sun

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on December 16th less than three weeks

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after he found it comet lovejoy would

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swoop through the sun's atmosphere only

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one hundred and twenty thousand

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kilometers above the stellar surface

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astronomers would soon realize a

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startling fact Comet Lovejoy likes it

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hot Terry found a sungrazer says Karl

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bottoms of the naval research lab in

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Washington DC it appeared to be as wide

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as two football fields the biggest such

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comet in nearly 40 years sungrazing

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comets aren't a new thing in fact the

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orbiting solar and heliospheric

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observatory soho watches one fall toward

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the Sun and evaporate every few days

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these frequent kamikaze comets are

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thought to be splinters of a giant comet

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that broke apart hundreds of years ago

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typically they measure about ten meters

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across small fragile and easily

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vaporized by solar heat based on its

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orbit Comet Lovejoy was surely a member

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of the same family except it was 200

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metres wide instead of the usual ten

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astronomers were eager to see the

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Whopper disintegrate there was little

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doubt that it would be destroyed when

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December 16th came however comet lovejoy

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Jacques de saucé as badams it survived

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and even flourished images from NASA's

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Solar Dynamics Observatory showed the

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comet vaporizing furiously as it entered

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the sun's atmosphere apparently on the

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verge of obliteration yet comet lovejoy

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was still intact when it emerged on the

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other side the comet had lost its tail

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during the fiery transit a temporary

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setback within hours the tail grew back

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bigger and brighter than before

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it's fair to say we were dumbfounded

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says matthew knight of the lowell

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observatory and the Johns Hopkins

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Applied Physics lab Comet Lovejoy must

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have been much bigger and tougher than

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we thought only a few days after it left

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the Sun the comet showed up in the

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morning skies of the southern hemisphere

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observers in Australia South America and

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New Zealand likened it to a search light

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beaming up from the east before dawn the

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tail lined up parallel to the Milky Way

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and for a few days made it seem that we

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lived in a double decker galaxy

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astronauts on the International Space

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Station also witnessed the comet ISS

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commander Dan Burbank who has seen his

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share of wonders even once flying

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directly through the northern lights on

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board the space shuttle declared Comet

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Lovejoy the most amazing thing I have

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ever seen in space an armada of

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spacecraft including Soho the solar

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dynamics observatory sdo NASA's twins

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Solar terrestrial relations Observatory

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probes stereo Japan's hinode spacecraft

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and Europe's proba to microsatellite

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recorded the historic event we have

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collected a mountain of data says night

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but there are some things were still

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having trouble explaining for instance

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what made Lovejoy's tail wiggles so

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wildly when it entered the solar corona

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perhaps it was in the grip of the sun's

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powerful magnetic field what caused

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Lovejoy to lose its tail inside the

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sun's atmosphere and then regain it

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later this is one of the biggest

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mysteries to me says badams and then

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there is the ultimate existential puzzle

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how did comet lovejoy survive at all the

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comet that liked it hot is returning to

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the outer solar system apparently still

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intact leaving many mysteries behind

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it'll be back in about 600 years says

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night maybe we will have figured them

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out by then

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to learn more about solar system