November 10, 2007
Somewhere above you, light is arriving from places so distant their names feel like poetry.
A Tale of Comet Holmes
Birthday · November 10, 2007
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APOD published November 10, 2007. Credit: Ivan Eder. A publication-date match, not a photo taken on your date. Independent of NASA.
A beautiful blue ion tail has become visible in deep telescopic images of Comet Holmes. Pointing generally away from the Sun and also planet Earth, the comet's ion tail is seriously foreshortened by our extreme viewing angle. Still, enthusiastic comet watchers have remarked that on the whole, the compact but tentacled appearance suggests a jellyfish or even a cosmic calamari. This stunning view of the comet's greenish coma and blue tail was recorded on November 4 in clear skies near Budapest, Hungary. The colors are caused by molecules in the tenuous gas, like C2 (green) and CO+ (blue), fluorescing in sunlight. In a more recent development, the dramatic inset is a deep image from L'Aquila in central Italy on November 8, showing the ion tail disconnecting from the comet.
Image credit: Ivan Eder