Comet
A long-period comet that became the brightest seen from the Northern Hemisphere in over two decades when it passed by in 2020.
| Type | Comet |
|---|---|
| Distance from the Sun | 358.00 AU |
| Diameter | 5 km |
| Mass | 3.30 × 10¹³ kg |
| Temperature | -258°C |
| Orbital period | 2,483,000 days |
| Rotation period | 7.58 hours |
| Apparent magnitude | 0.9 |
| Redshift | 0 |
| Discovered | 2020 |
Comets are icy bodies that vaporise as they near the Sun, and it's that boiling-off gas and dust, not the comet itself, that forms the tail.
At 5 km across, C/2020 F3 (NEOWISE) is less than a thousandth of the diameter of Earth.
Its mass is less than a thousandth of the mass of Earth.
It keeps an average distance of 358 AU from the Sun, so sunlight takes 49.6 hours to reach it.
A single orbit takes 6,798 years.
An average temperature of 15 K works out at -258 degrees Celsius, colder than the 15 degrees Earth averages.
It has been on record since 2020.
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