New comet C/2010 X1 Elenin

[Outbackmanyep]

From Con Stoitsis, Director of ASV Comet Section:

"The most recent update, M.P.E.C. 2011-A08 issued Jan 3 2011, advises the comet wil pass perihelion on Sept 11, at a distance of 0.48AU.
The comet will then encounter the Earth on Oct 17, at 0.22 AU."

Cheers!

[Greg Bryant]

Yes, that's the MPEC update I referred to in my post of 5th January.

You'll note that e is assumed to equal 1 there. That assumption is kept locked for a while until the orbit becomes a lot more clearer.

Greg

[CometGuy]

There is an updated orbit now available.

http://www.minorplanetcenter.org/mpec/K11/K11A38.html

Tending towards a hyperbolic orbit now. Greg, not sure what your thoughts are, but this one looks intrinsically faint and might not be all that bright. Hope I'm wrong though.

Terry

[Greg Bryant]

Terry,

If it turns out to be a first-time visitor, its intrinsic faintness and small perihelion distance may mean it won't survive perihelion. Looking at the data, it's somewhat on the borderline of the empirical study that the US comet observer John Bortle did 20 years ago on the survivability of faint comets at small perihelion distances.

Greg

[mithrandir (Andrew)]

Stellarium values updated from Horizons. MPC K11A38 gives the same values. Now there is enough data Horizons has dropped the initial state warning.

Based on current data it seems best viewing will be early evenings in mid to late August and mornings in mid to late October. The predicted peak of mag 3.7 will be during daylight hours of mid September.

As per before - drop the last 3 lines for versions before 0.10.6.1

[Elenin_C2010_X1]
# Data taken from JPL/HORIZONS
# correct for the specified time frame:
# Start Time : A.D. 2011-Jan-13 00:00:00.0000 CT 
# Stop Time  : A.D. 2011-Jan-13 00:00:00.0000 CT 
# Soln.date: 2011-Jan-10_13:50:27 #obs: 128
name                        = Comet Elenin (C/2010 X1)              
parent                      = Sun
coord_func                  = comet_orbit
oblateness                  = 0.0
lighting                    = true
halo                        = true
color                       = 1.0,1.0,1.0
tex_halo                    = star16x16.png
tex_map                     = nomap.png
lighting                    = false
orbit_Epoch                 = 2455574.500000000
orbit_TimeAtPericenter      = 2455813.862988451
orbit_PericenterDistance    = 0.4761818696091473
orbit_Eccentricity          = 1.00180658958685
orbit_ArgOfPericenter       = 343.8737206876458
orbit_AscendingNode         = 323.2698639476119
orbit_Inclination           = 1.842601691873348
radius                      = 25
albedo                      = 0.15
absolute_magnitude          = 10.7
absolute_magnitude          = 13.7
type                        = comet