User highlight: comet in LASCO-C2

YouTube and Helioviewer.org user galaxy387 posted the video below showing a comet falling towards the Sun.

LASCO (Large Angle Spectrometric COronagraph) on board the SOHO spacecraft has seen very many comets since it started observing in 1996. SOHO has reported over 2000 comets, almost all of them found by members of the public. Thanks to the many amateur observers that hunt for comets in SOHO data, SOHO has seen many more comets than any other mission (there was another bright comet observed on May 10-11, 2011. A lot of these comets come from the Kreutz sungrazer family of comets. There is an active community of comet hunters, so if you think you’ve discovered one – and it is certainly possible that you may have – please check the latest reports over there. Thanks for sharing, galaxy387!

Written on July 6, 2011 by jack