Ace of Spades HQ

November 28, 2013

Comet ISON's Moment of Truth Arrives
— CAC

The comet, now traveling at a fraction of the speed of light, will face scorching heat and extreme gravitational forces as it approaches perihelion, 1:37PM (Eastern) today.
NASA has a Google Hangout today from 1:00 to 3:30 with live updates, and a mirror for the LASCO 3 camera (the direct link keeps crashing from traffic) can be found here.

Oh and most important, this page will have "live" images from the Solar Dynamics Observatory, aiming to capture the comets entry and exit.

Here's hoping ISON can bring it.

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

Posted by: CAC at 08:30 AM | Comments (49)
Post contains 103 words, total size 1 kb.

1 SMOD!

Posted by: Y-not on the phone at November 28, 2013 08:34 AM (zDsvJ)

2 Bring it sweet comet o' death!

Posted by: wisenheimer at November 28, 2013 08:39 AM (kidco)

3 I wanna see some tail Sunday morning!

Posted by: wisenheimer at November 28, 2013 08:40 AM (kidco)

4 I hope ISON brings some elbows.

Posted by: garrett at November 28, 2013 08:40 AM (lHBX+)

5 Please be to Ear Leader what Halley was to Harold...

Posted by: delayna at November 28, 2013 08:43 AM (KnC4k)

6 The comet, now traveling at a fraction of the speed of light...

*Everything* is traveling at a fraction of the speed of light. Math is funny that way.

Posted by: Anachronda at November 28, 2013 08:44 AM (U82Km)

7 ISON? Bupkiss.

Posted by: SMOD at November 28, 2013 08:44 AM (zXDqy)

8 Here's the distance and speed link from the right sidebar. I've had it open in a tab and check on it now and then: http://www.cometison2013.co.uk/perihelion-and-distance/ I found this link to the Solar Dynamics Observatory spacecraft, which is showing near real-time photos: http://cometison.gsfc.nasa.gov/#

Posted by: rickl at November 28, 2013 08:45 AM (sdi6R)

9 If you go to my SDO link and click "view kiosk", it will load the images taken so far and play them like a movie. It may induce seizures, though.

Posted by: rickl at November 28, 2013 08:58 AM (sdi6R)

10 Eh...this was posted on The Federalist weeks ago.

Posted by: CharlieBrown'sDildo at November 28, 2013 09:07 AM (oJ5Fd)

11 Ison sent his scouts to whack that little kid in the head, right?

Posted by: EROWMER at November 28, 2013 09:08 AM (OONaw)

12 The first clear skies we've seen in ages, and the damned comet will probably asplode out of view.

Posted by: DamnDirtyRINO at November 28, 2013 09:16 AM (m0h0I)

13 My Thanksgiving Day gift to CAC is linked in my sock.

Posted by: [/i]andycanuck[/b] at November 28, 2013 09:20 AM (ZyZIo)

14 Fraction of the speed of light? So it's going to go around the sun back to 1988 to kill all the whales?

Posted by: Methos at November 28, 2013 09:27 AM (hO9ad)

15 I like to imagine this little comet feller giving the Sun a big finger as it whizzes past...

Posted by: Juan de Hattatime at November 28, 2013 09:37 AM (p7LQY)

16 Looks like it may have broken up. The "show" may be over. Gravity, how does that work?

Posted by: pawn at November 28, 2013 09:39 AM (xxdkI)

17 Uh, oh, the Distance and Speed page blew up when the clock hit zero. You have to chase the display down the screen.

Posted by: rickl at November 28, 2013 09:40 AM (sdi6R)

18 I'm not seeing it at all in the SDO images.

Posted by: rickl at November 28, 2013 09:41 AM (sdi6R)

19 Thank you. Happy Thanksgiving!

Posted by: Carol at November 28, 2013 09:42 AM (z4WKX)

20 I can't watch on this iPad. I'll use computer. Thank you, CAC.

Posted by: Carol at November 28, 2013 09:47 AM (z4WKX)

21 So...what happened? I can't get in on any web sites. Did it survive?

Posted by: Juan de Hattatime at November 28, 2013 09:57 AM (p7LQY)

22 I havenÂ’t seen anything either.

Posted by: Carol at November 28, 2013 10:03 AM (z4WKX)

23 Damn.

Posted by: wisenheimer at November 28, 2013 10:10 AM (4ACTX)

24 CAC Happy Thanksgiving to you and yours!

Posted by: Thunderb at November 28, 2013 10:10 AM (zOTsN)

25 No nucleus, no tail.

Posted by: wisenheimer at November 28, 2013 10:12 AM (4ACTX)

26 Oh well, Happy Thanksgiving to all!

Posted by: wisenheimer at November 28, 2013 10:13 AM (4ACTX)

27 This link is has a good animated .gif of the comet approaching the sun and the disappearing behind it.

http://198.118.248.97/data/LATEST/current_c3.gif

Stay turgid, Morons.

Posted by: SnakePlizzken at November 28, 2013 10:17 AM (E1gBU)

28 I've been looking around for up-to-the-minute reports, but I haven't found anything. I'm strongly suspecting that it vaporized before perihelion.

Posted by: rickl at November 28, 2013 10:17 AM (sdi6R)

29 Pink Floyd - Set The Controls For The Heart Of The Sun
http://tinyurl.com/mdxuw6d

Posted by: DaveA[/i][/b][/s] at November 28, 2013 10:22 AM (DL2i+)

30 What fraction of c are we talking about, like, zero point one trillion zeroes one?

Posted by: Dave M at November 28, 2013 10:23 AM (YfETb)

31 I'm watching the Google Hangout now, and yes, it does indeed appear to have disintegrated. I'm old enough to remember the last Comet of the Century, Kohoutek. Heh.

Posted by: rickl at November 28, 2013 10:26 AM (sdi6R)

32 Around perihelion the comet would have been traveling around 830,000 MPH. This is 0.00124% of the speed of light. And, the SOHO images I was able to see as the comet dove in, it did look like it fizzled out and disintegrated. I doubt it is going to emerge at all.

Posted by: John at November 28, 2013 10:27 AM (PR1wH)

33

Ah -- Ah -- Ah -- *Kohoutek!*

Posted by: Laurie David's Cervix at November 28, 2013 10:31 AM (kdS6q)

34 Oh, well. The next big event for today will be SpaceX's second attempt to launch the Turkey 9, er, Falcon 9 at 5:39 pm EST. The first attempt was scrubbed on Monday due to a sticking LOX valve on the first stage. Live coverage will start at around 5:00. http://www.spacex.com/webcast/ Hopefully it won't disintegrate, too. Although a rocket disintegration is considerably more spectacular than a comet disintegration.

Posted by: rickl at November 28, 2013 10:32 AM (sdi6R)

35 Comment at the Google Hangout on YouTube: "ISON is now ISOFF"

Posted by: rickl at November 28, 2013 10:45 AM (sdi6R)

36 Obama lied . Ison died

Posted by: Illini Bill at November 28, 2013 10:48 AM (ix/Qh)

37 re: Posted by: rickl at November 28, 2013 02:32 PM (sdi6R)

I was home on Monday with either a stomach virus or a "minor" case of food poisoning. I was so sick, but I got the live feed to that launch and set here like a kid in the late 60's watching the Apollo launches. I was so upset when it was finally canceled.

Anyway, I have now booked marked their website, use the calendar function and then signed up for their email notifications. I will be waiting for today's launch.

Thanks Rickl

Posted by: Taiwan_Joe at November 28, 2013 11:06 AM (aKhUT)

38 3 I got the live feed to that launch and set here like a kid in the late 60's watching the Apollo launches. Posted by: Taiwan_Joe at November 28, 2013 03:06 PM (aKhUT) I know exactly what you mean. I also watched the Gemini and Apollo launches when I was a kid, and I find SpaceX launches to be nail-biting drama. When they launched Dragon to the ISS for the first time in May 2012, I set my alarm for 3:00 am on a work night to watch it. It was absolutely thrilling. I've watched all kinds of other launches over the years, but there is just something about a SpaceX launch.

Posted by: rickl at November 28, 2013 11:18 AM (sdi6R)

39 I'm old enough to remember the last Comet of the Century, Kohoutek. Heh. I was a freshman in high school back then, and I used to ride the city bus line to school. In the downtown area where those of us that would wait for the second bus of the two-bus trip, there were Jehovah's Witnesses hanging around passing out fliers that insinuated there would be an apocalypse some particular time after the comet passed Earth. I don't remember if they were embarrassed by their incorrect prediction...

Posted by: Blacque Jacques Shellacque at November 28, 2013 11:30 AM (VVsZ2)

40 The runup and eventual disappointment of ISON is the Healthcare.Org of the Oort cloud.

Posted by: Fringe at November 28, 2013 12:26 PM (iS9N/)

41 Eh, it seems to be back. Or maybe the rubble is still in a nice pile. Good stuff. Hope we can see it again in a few days.

Posted by: Juan de Hattatime at November 28, 2013 03:22 PM (p7LQY)

42 I've got the phenobarbital, pudding, and Keds ready. The Meanie Solar Collective is prepared for its encounter.

Posted by: Big Fat Meanie at November 28, 2013 03:35 PM (rXldn)

43 Well dip me in dog shit. ISON appears to have emerged from it's fiery traverse relatively intact(?). The CMEs etc it flew through today blew the tail off and probably baked away several million or billion tons of material but enough of it remains to light up another tail. Look here: http://tinyurl.com/wttk6 (It may take a while as the link is being hammered) You can just see the tail reforming as a veil like mist trailing away to the left of the image.

Posted by: TrueNorthist at November 28, 2013 05:15 PM (3Aixx)

44 If I'm walking the dog down to the park, aren't I also traveling at a fraction of the speed of light?

Posted by: Scott M at November 28, 2013 05:57 PM (vMc5E)

45 #43- I'm checking the same feed and a couple others and hoping. But I also read (I think at Sky and Telescope) that everyone is pretty confident the nucleus is vaporized and what we are seeing is the tail only while it's still dense. It should disperse and evaporate. It should... This damn thing hasn't acted once like it was supposed to.

Posted by: Coop at November 28, 2013 06:27 PM (lcpqc)

46 There's a new post up at the CIOC blog that gives a little clarity. It may indeed have survived. Or not. http://www.isoncampaign.org/blog

Posted by: Coop at November 28, 2013 07:39 PM (lcpqc)

47 All the equivocating is the direct result of our new state of post normal science, where observation and empirical evidence place second to the consensus of "experts". They declared ISON dead prematurely and now have to come up with an explanation that keeps their expert status intact. Expect to hear lots of talk of how wonderful and mysterious the universe is while they focus-group some excuses.

Posted by: TrueNorthist at November 29, 2013 05:43 AM (3Aixx)

48 Latest C3 image: http://tinyurl.com/kqrdn9u Looks like a comet to me but what do I know?

Posted by: TrueNorthist at November 29, 2013 06:11 AM (3Aixx)

49 Some comet pron: http://tinyurl.com/nracqjv

Posted by: TrueNorthist at November 29, 2013 06:18 AM (3Aixx)

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