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Want to see a comet spinning through the earth? A good opportunity to catch one of these heavenly visitors is tonight's night, when Comet 21P / Giacobini-Zinner will be best seen in binoculars or a telescope.
The comet, also known as "21P", will approach the Earth around 2:30 EDT Monday (6:30 GMT). According to EarthSky.org, the bright green comet is expected to reach a visual magnitude of 6.5 to 7. This makes the 21P bright enough to see at the naked eye – but not quite. [Bright Comets of 2018: When, Where and How to See Them]
Watch with binoculars early tomorrow morning (September 10th) to see comet 21P / Giacobini-Zinner cross the sky. The astrophotographer Alexander Vasenin took a picture of the comet of Moscow Oblast, Russia on August 18, 2018. Credit: Alexander Vasenin / Wikimedia Commons / CC BY-SA 4.0
To find comet 21P in the night sky, look to the east and find the Auriga constellation between midnight and dawn local time. The comet will still be visible after tomorrow, but it will vanish over the next few days. Its exact, topical position is available in NASA's ephemeris calculator.
Comets are small bodies of ice and dust that revolve around the sun, as the planets do. But comets are much smaller than planets and travel in very elliptical orbits. Comet 21P circled the sun every 6.6 years and its trail of dust and debris is the source of the October meteor shower that takes place every year.
This sky map shows the approximate position of comet 21P / Giacobini-Zinner as it approaches closest to Earth on September 10, 2018, at 02:27 EDT (0627 GMT), as seen from New York.
Credit: SkySafari App
Meteors are spatial dusts or space rocks that enter the Earth's atmosphere. Meteorite showers usually occur when the Earth crosses the dust path left by a comet or asteroid. While some meteor showers produce dozens of shooting stars or more every hour, Draconids are quite weak. The shower is expected to generate only eight shooting stars per hour in 2018, told NASA's meteorite specialist Bill Cooke. [Amazing Photos of Comet 21P/Giacobini-Zinner and Comet 46P/Wirtanen]
Even if you do not have binoculars or if you miss the Comet 21P for any other reason, do not worry: you will probably have the chance to watch another green comet later this year. Comet 46P / Wirtanen will make its closest approach to the sun on December 16th and current predictions indicate that the comet will be visible to the naked eye. You can see more information about 46P in this recent story from Space.com. You can also see here images of the two approaching comets.
follow us @Spacedotcom, Facebookand Google+. Original article on Space.com.
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