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Massive Comet, C/2014 UN271 Is NOT — Repeat ‘NOT’ — Hurtling Towards Earth; It Is BUT Media Clickbait.

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by Anura Guruge
on April 14, 2022

From ‘Google News‘. Click to ENLARGE.
From JPL. Click to ENLARGE. Annotations are mine. Note, it is not even coming as close as Saturn — & Saturn is a long, long, long way out. See, you can’t even see Earth’s orbit at this scale.

Yes, C/2014 UN271 is big & it is entering the planetary region of our Solar System. But, it is on an orbit that keeps it way, way, way, way away from the Earth. Please, please study that diagram above. Note that its orbit keeps it even further away from the Sun & Earth than even Saturn — & Saturn (on average) is 840 million miles away. Nearly 9.5 times the Earth-Sun distance! Let me even say it in Light Years to express that it is NOT close — 0.00015 light years.

It is NOT — I repeat ‘NOT’ — hurtling towards the Earth.

It is not even hurtling towards the Sun.

It is way out there, 840 million miles away. [The Sun, in comparison, is 90 million miles away.]

And just in case you are wondering, I do know a thing or two (or four) about comets. SMILE. And that was my 5th book on comets.

Click image for Amazon listing for book.

The SUPPOSED ‘Mega Comet’, C/2014 UN271: Don’t Get Fooled By The Uninformed Media Hype.

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by Anura Guruge
on June 25, 2021

From ‘Google News‘. Click to ENLARGE.
From JPL. Click to ENLARGE. Annotations are mine.

Yes, it is mega-exciting BUT let’s not get carried away. This is the first body that has been identified from pouring over the huge amount of imagery obtained, 2014 to 2018, from the (so called) ‘Dark Energy Survey‘. So, there very well might be quite a few bodies like this — with similar, highly-elongated orbits.

I am not convinced as yet that it is a bona fide comet. For it to be a comet, it, at a minimum, must sport a coma. A tail (or two (or three)) would be nice (& a bonus) — but not mandatory. But, we have to have a coma, i.e., the fuzzy shroud that surrounds the nucleus of the comet. The coma is formed when the sun’s radiation (mainly the heat) starts to sublimate (vaporize) icy matter from the comet’s body. I don’t think C/2014 UN271 comes close enough to the sun for sublimation to occur. No sublimation –> No coma. No coma –> NOT a comet. Simple as that. Without a coma it is an asteroid, a dwarf planet or minor planet.

Click image to access my April 2022 post.

I think ‘we’ have rushed to judgment way too prematurely. We need to study this more.

And just in case you are wondering, I do know a thing or two (or four) about comets. SMILE. And that was my 5th book on comets.

Click image for Amazon listing for book.