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Credit & Copyright: Fritz Helmut Hemmerich
Explanation:
How can a comet have three tails?
Normally,
a comet has
two tails: an
ion tail
of charged particles emitted by the comet and pushed out by the wind from the Sun,
and a
dust tail of small debris that orbits behind the comet but is also pushed out,
to some degree, by the solar wind.
Frequently a comet will appear to have only
one tail
because the other tail is not easily visible from the Earth.
In the
featured
unusual image,
Comet 2P/Encke appears to have three
tails because the ion tail split just near to the time when the image was taken.
The complex solar wind is occasionally
turbulent and sometimes creates
unusual
structure in an ion tail.
On rare occasions even
ion-tail disconnection events have been recorded.
An image of the Comet Encke taken two days later gives a perhaps
less perplexing perspective.
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NASA Web Site Statements, Warnings, and Disclaimers
NASA Official: Jay Norris. Specific rights apply.
A service of: LHEA at NASA / GSFC
& Michigan Tech. U.
Based on Astronomy Picture
Of the Day
Publications with keywords: comet
Publications with words: comet
See also:
- APOD: 2024 April 17 Á Total Eclipse and Comets
- APOD: 2024 April 8 Á The Changing Ion Tail of Comet Pons Brooks
- Comet Pons-Brooks at Night
- APOD: 2024 March 18 Á Comet Pons Brooks Swirling Coma
- Comet 12P/Pons Brooks in Northern Spring
- Structure in the Tail of Comet 12P/Pons Brooks
- The Snows of Churyumov Gerasimenko