Latest indications are this relatively small comet has broken into even smaller, even less significant, chunks of dust and ice. This trail of piffling particles will remain on the same path as the original comet, completing its unexceptional swing through the inner solar system this fall. They will trail along in a debris cloud that will follow a well-understood path out of the inner solar system.
After that, we won't see the scraps of comet Elenin around these parts for almost 12 millennia. Twelve millennia may be a long time to Earthlings, but for those frozen inhabitants of the outer solar system who make this commute, a dozen millennia give or take is a walk in the celestial park. Though the propecies about Elenin failed to come true, the apocalyptically minded may not want to leave their bunkers just yet.
After all, Christian-radio broadcaster Harold Camping says the world will end on Oct. Using clues he prised from the Bible, Camping originally pegged the Rapture for May 21, , but revised his prediction when that date came and went without apparent incident.
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As is common with comet discoveries, Elenin was first spotted by an amateur. When he spotted the comet on Dec. While some people may have been hoping for a good show similar to what comets Hale-Bopp and Hyakutake put in the s, as early as August NASA said Elenin would probably be visible in binoculars , at best — if it lived up to predictions.
Just as certainly, it will not cause any disruptions here on Earth. After a short while, it will be headed back out again, and we will not see or hear from Elenin for thousands of years. That's pretty cool.
Comets are unpredictable beasts. The conglomerates of icy debris tend to erupt at unpredictable times, making it difficult for astronomers to figure out how bright they will be and if they will even survive the trip toward the inner solar system. Elenin made predictions more difficult because it was a long-period comet, meaning that it originated from an area at the edge of the solar system. I guess all those pseudoscientific bloggers who predicted planet-altering encounters with a cosmic visitor bright enough to be seen in broad daylight will just have to find something else to worry about.
Just seen this article and find it odd that NASA's JPL is still tracking it by it's gravity and noticed its creating more as it gets closer. So it is is in fact self destructed, then what is creating the gravitational pull that can still be detected right now by JPL?
Just wondering from a scientific point of view. Log in to Reply. If Elenin has broken apart, do we not stand a good chance of an incredible Comet Elenin meteor storm because the smaller pieces will be effected differently by the sun's gravity differently than the whole body, slowing the broken leftovers enough to have them rain down on the planet as we cross Elenin's original orbit. It seemed pretty certain that a comet racing past the sun at a speed it had never before achieved or at least not in the past 6 or 7 thousand years would be fragile enough to be unable to stand its hard right turn around the sun.
Unfortunately Richimon, the prospects for a meteor shower from Elenin debris in the coming months are not very good: bautforum. This way you can used published ephemeride data on Comet Elenin to check his computations for accuracy. It looks as if very little if any material from the comet's breakup will be traveling fast enough to intercept the Earth, inbound anyways. I don't know where you get this icy nucleus. Just another example of ignoring evidence to support an unsupported theory.
You may wish to check your facts or lack thereof before writing for Sky and Telescope. You know it's so funny that the closer this thing gets, the more people are trying to dissuade everyone from worrying about it.
I mean, if it has just "self-destructed", I guess all the money spent on the bunkers, FEMA drills and stored food has gone to waste, huh? Sorry, but I call b. Just to clarify a few things: First, the material from Comet Elenin willcontinue to orbit the Sun, though it will be too dispersed to appear bright. Second, JPL may or may not be tracking the comet, but the websites referred to contain predictions, not observations, and they are not always updated regularly.
Third, spacecraft analysis of comets confirms what we've known for a long time: that they're largely composed of water ice, together with a huge variety of other materials. And finally, as all educated and open-mindeed people are well aware, there was never any scientific basis whatsoever for all the doom-mongers.
I will be happy to bet any amount of money at even odds that no astronomical catastrophe will happen in the next two years. Sorry I came to this site. Why Elenin? How I long for the days when internet access wasn't so readily available and funding for state mental facilities was more abundant.
I would imagine that the coming year has a lot of doom sayers looking for any sign that could lead to our demise. Comets have always been one of the many scenarios that would fit the plot of our predicted end There seems to be a cottage industry these days in doom and destruction. I think it dovetails with the economic and political climate as much as anything. Pan-STARRS in will likely be the next web sensation, if people emerge from their shelters after next year's Mayan catastrophe doesn't happen.
Who knows why conspiracy theorists do what they do? Mass hysteria? A need to feel superior? I vote for a subtle mental illness. As a tried and true Scientific Skeptic, I know science delivers the goods. Nothing else in the history of mankind has ever been as productive and beneficial as science.. There is pseudo science everywhere. Even tho, we really need all hands on deck as leaders are also prone to making policy based on ideology rather than science. Now: Back on topic.
Has this been confirmed with follow up observations Did the nucleus break apart? Or in the process of? It seems that the perception of so many is swayed by the misinterpretion of pass history and fears of reprisal causing some to view the unknown with paranoia and fear, while others sway opinion to create a profit, or gain advantage.
This creates suspicion of motive and harms credibility. I'm in awe at how such an intelligent beautiful God so individually unique could have so precisely mislead yourself so far from your original intention life in paradise loving and enjoying yourself in you image with likeness.. Many Gods are attracted here to know from the living things how a God made God's of himself and now serves God's while looking for God.
Amnesia is the cause of your infinite search in search of yourself. So inflicted by amnesia you search even the dust of your own universe, with hope of a clue to who you are.
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