The Tails of Comet Hyakutake
2.05.1996

What makes comet tails so colorful? This photograph of Comet Hyakutake was taken the night of April 18th and highlights different components of the tail. The gold and red tail features are dust, made predominately of little bits of rock and carbon. The dust tail shines by reflecting sunlight.

Comet Machholz in View
5.01.2005

Good views of Comet Machholz are in store for northern hemisphere comet watchers in January. Now making its closest approach to planet Earth, the comet will pass near the lovely Pleiades star cluster on January 7th and the double star cluster in Perseus on January 27th as Machholz moves relatively quickly through the evening sky.

Comet Catalina Emerges
7.12.2015

Comet Catalina is ready for its close-up. The giant snowball from the outer Solar System, known formally as C/2013 US10 (Catalina), rounded the Sun last month and is now headed for its closest approach to Earth in January.

Periodic Comet Swift Tuttle
8.08.2024

A Halley-type comet with an orbital period of about 133 years, Comet 109P/Swift-Tuttle is recognized as the parent of the annual Perseid Meteor Shower. The comet's last visit to the inner Solar System was in 1992.

Tempel-Tuttle: The Leonid Comet
30.01.1998

Star trails streak this composite time exposure of Comet Tempel-Tuttle recorded by T. Puckett on January 26. Presently passing through the inner solar system on its 33 year orbit around the Sun, Tempel-Tuttle has brightened unexpectedly, but binoculars or small telescopes are still required to visually observe it.

Comet PanSTARRS and the Helix Nebula
5.06.2016

It's rare that such different objects are imaged so close together. Such an occasion is occurring now, though, and was captured two days ago in combined parallel exposures from the Canary Islands of Spain.

Comet 67P from Spacecraft Rosetta
2.02.2016

Spacecraft Rosetta continues to circle and map Comet Churyumov-Gerasimenko. Crossing the inner Solar System for ten years to reach the vicinity of the comet in 2014, the robotic spacecraft continues to image the unusual double-lobed comet nucleus. The featured image, taken one year ago, shows dust and gas escaping from the comet's nucleus.

Southern Comet
18.01.2007

After a remarkable performance in the northern hemisphere, the brightest comet in decades is now showing off in the south. Recorded during evening twilight on January 17, this view features the bright coma...

Hale Bopp: The Great Comet of 1997
31.03.2007

Ten short years ago, Comet Hale-Bopp rounded the Sun and offered a dazzling spectacle in planet Earth's night. This stunning view, recorded shortly after the comet's perihelion passage on April 1, 1997, features the memorable tails of Hale-Bopp -- a whitish dust tail and blue ion tail.

APOD: 2025 February 2 Б Comet G3 ATLAS Disintegrates
2.02.2025

What's happening to Comet G3 ATLAS? After passing near the Sun in mid-January, the head of the comet has become dimmer and dimmer. By late January, Comet C/2024 G3 (ATLAS) had become a headless wonder -- even though it continued to show impressive tails after sunset in the skies of Earth's Southern Hemisphere.