COLLECTION NAME:
NASA Astronomy Picture of the Day Collection
Record
Title:
Comet and Aurora Over Alaska
Explanation:
Can you spot the comet? Flowing across the frozen Alaskan [ http://www.state.ak… ] landscape is an easily visible, colorful aurora. Just to the lower left, however, well in the background, is something harder to spot: Comet Ikeya-Zhang [ http://cometography… ], the brightest comet of recent years. Although the aurora [ http://www.geo.mtu.… ] faded in minutes, the comet [ http://cfa-www.harv… ] is just now beginning to fade [ http://cfa-www.harv… ]. It remains just barely visible [ http://encke.jpl.na… ] without aid, however, before sunrise in the East. The comet is actually a giant dirt-covered snowball [ http://antwrp.gsfc.… ] that spends most of its time in the outer Solar System [ http://antwrp.gsfc.… ] -- to where it is now returns. The above photograph [ http://science.nasa… ] was taken on March 20 when Comet Ikeya-Zhang [ http://antwrp.gsfc.… ] was near its brightest. Careful inspection of the photo will uncover several other sky delights, including the giant galaxy M31 [ http://antwrp.gsfc.… ].
keyword:
Alaska
facet_where:
Alaska
facet_what:
Aurora
UID:
SPD-APOD-ap020422
