Reports that comet ISON C/2012 S1 has failed to survive its journey around the sun may be wrong

Written by Gary on November 29th, 2013

According to the latest reports based on images such as the following, it seems that comet ISON has failed to survive it’s close encounter with the sun which will be a big disappointment for those in the northern hemisphere hoping to see a bright comet next week.

Note that the brightest part of the comet is no longer the head:

 

comet ISON Nov 28th 2013

However, since this image, a later image shows it is still there:

comet survives

But as of 29th Nov, reports are that it has substantially faded to a magnitude of around +2.9 with suggestions that if the comet reappears it will probably be a large diffuse object without the usual dense comet head, and with a magnitude of +5 which will be a disappointment to those in the north hoping for a bright comet for Christmas.

 

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