{"id":40235,"date":"2023-01-19T11:23:32","date_gmt":"2023-01-19T11:23:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcskyatnight\/?post_type=purple_issue&#038;p=40235"},"modified":"2023-01-19T11:23:32","modified_gmt":"2023-01-19T11:23:32","slug":"comets-and-asteroids-15","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcskyatnight\/2023\/01\/19\/comets-and-asteroids-15\/","title":{"rendered":"Comets and asteroids"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"has-text-align-center intro\">Fingers crossed for comet C\/2022 E3 ZTF reaching naked-eye visibility this month <\/p>\n\n<div class=\"no-tts wp-block-image article-in-image bild\"><figure class=\"no-tts aligncenter\"><img loading=\"lazy\" width=\"1206\" height=\"909\" src=\"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/77\/2023\/01\/41c0b74b-669f-42c4-8eed-e691d9fe93b3.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"no-tts wp-image-40234\" srcset=\"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/77\/2023\/01\/41c0b74b-669f-42c4-8eed-e691d9fe93b3.jpg 1206w, https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/77\/2023\/01\/41c0b74b-669f-42c4-8eed-e691d9fe93b3-300x226.jpg 300w, https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/77\/2023\/01\/41c0b74b-669f-42c4-8eed-e691d9fe93b3-1024x772.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/77\/2023\/01\/41c0b74b-669f-42c4-8eed-e691d9fe93b3-768x579.jpg 768w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1206px) 100vw, 1206px\" \/><figcaption>From 11 February, moonlight abates as the comet nears Mars <\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n<p class=\"article-full-body sans-serif\">Comet C\/2022 E3 ZTF is well-positioned at the start of February, high in the sky and theoretically above the threshold for nakedeye visibility. There are a couple of reasons why this is unlikely to be the case though. First, the comet is expected to reach a peak magnitude of +4.8 around the end of January and start of February. Comet magnitudes can be misleading because they refer to how bright the object would look if its light were condensed into a single point like a star. <\/p>\n\n<p class=\"article-full-body sans-serif\">If the comet has a tangible size, that light is spread out, making its surface dimmer than its rating would suggest. Secondly, there will be a bright Moon and this will sadly diminish the appearance of C\/2022 E3 ZTF. You can find where the comet will be throughout February in <a href=\"navto:\/\/index\/32\">the Big Three<\/a>, and as it passes some easy-to-find sky markers, there is a good chance to catch it using binoculars or a small telescope. <\/p>\n\n<p class=\"article-full-body sans-serif\">C\/2022 E3 ZTF was discovered by the Zwicky Transient Facility (ZTF) on 2 March 2022. The ZTF is a widefield survey setup using an infrared- and visible-light-sensitive camera attached to the 1.22m Samuel Oschin Telescope at the Palomar Observatory in California. The object was originally thought to be an asteroid shining at mag. +17.3 when discovered, at a distance 4.3 times further from the Sun than Earth. It\u2019s a long-period comet with an orbit that takes around 50,000 years to complete. At the farthest <span>point in its orbit it lies 2,800 AU from the Sun; at its closest it is 1.11 AU, which last occurred on 12 January. The orbital positions of Earth and the comet mean that C\/2022 E3 ZTF will be closest to our planet on 2 February, separated from us by a mere 43 million kilometres (0.29 AU).<\/span><\/p>\n\n<p class=\"footer\">PHOTO: PETE LAWRENCE<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Fingers crossed for comet C\/2022 E3 ZTF reaching naked-eye visibility this month <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":24,"featured_media":40234,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ub_ctt_via":"","purple_page_number":"53","purple_custom_meta_purple_page_number":"53","purple_seq_number":"1","purple_custom_meta_purple_seq_number":"1","purple_source_article":"article_53-1.xml","purple_custom_meta_purple_source_article":"article_53-1.xml","purple_source_issue":"February-2023","purple_custom_meta_purple_source_issue":"February-2023","purple_external_id":"February-2023-53-1","purple_custom_meta_purple_external_id":"February-2023-53-1","purple_issue_code":"|0000086561||","purple_custom_meta_purple_issue_code":"|0000086561||","purple_android_product":"com.im.skyatnight.213","purple_custom_meta_purple_android_product":"com.im.skyatnight.213","purple_ios_product":"com.im.skyatnight.213","purple_custom_meta_purple_ios_product":"com.im.skyatnight.213","purple_web_product":"","purple_custom_meta_purple_web_product":"","purple_publication_id":"075fab74-0a21-4201-866a-899d6c41c40c","purple_migrated":"","kt_blocks_editor_width":""},"categories":[22],"tags":[14],"featured_image_src":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/77\/2023\/01\/41c0b74b-669f-42c4-8eed-e691d9fe93b3.jpg","author_info":{"display_name":"importmanagerhub@sprylab.com","author_link":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcskyatnight\/author\/importmanagerhubsprylab-com\/"},"acf":{"readingTimeMinutes":"2","apple_news_title":""},"uagb_featured_image_src":{"full":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/77\/2023\/01\/41c0b74b-669f-42c4-8eed-e691d9fe93b3.jpg",1206,909,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/77\/2023\/01\/41c0b74b-669f-42c4-8eed-e691d9fe93b3-150x150.jpg",150,150,true],"medium":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/77\/2023\/01\/41c0b74b-669f-42c4-8eed-e691d9fe93b3-300x226.jpg",300,226,true],"medium_large":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/77\/2023\/01\/41c0b74b-669f-42c4-8eed-e691d9fe93b3-768x579.jpg",768,579,true],"large":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/77\/2023\/01\/41c0b74b-669f-42c4-8eed-e691d9fe93b3-1024x772.jpg",800,603,true],"1536x1536":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/77\/2023\/01\/41c0b74b-669f-42c4-8eed-e691d9fe93b3.jpg",1206,909,false],"2048x2048":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/77\/2023\/01\/41c0b74b-669f-42c4-8eed-e691d9fe93b3.jpg",1206,909,false]},"uagb_author_info":{"display_name":"importmanagerhub@sprylab.com","author_link":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcskyatnight\/author\/importmanagerhubsprylab-com\/"},"uagb_comment_info":0,"uagb_excerpt":"Fingers crossed for comet C\/2022 E3 ZTF reaching naked-eye visibility this month","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcskyatnight\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40235"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcskyatnight\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcskyatnight\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcskyatnight\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/24"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcskyatnight\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=40235"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcskyatnight\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40235\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":40927,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcskyatnight\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40235\/revisions\/40927"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcskyatnight\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/40234"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcskyatnight\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=40235"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcskyatnight\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=40235"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcskyatnight\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=40235"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}