A newly discovered green comet will make its big debut next week before disappearing for four centuries.
The half-mile-sized Comet Nishimura will likely be visible to the naked eye from the Northern Hemisphere for an incredible five mornings after entering the solar system on Tuesday. According to EarthSky.
The ice ball will be closest to Earth on September 12th, but it will pass a safe distance of 78 million miles as it hurtles toward the sun.
If the comet survives its collision with the Sun, it should be visible again at the end of the month, but this time only from the Southern Hemisphere.
Although visible to the naked eye, those looking to catch a glimpse of Mt. Nishimura are warned that the trail is faintly visible.
Early risers should look to the northeast horizon about 90 minutes before dawn and expect to see the comet pass about 10 degrees above the horizon near the constellation Leo.
The green comet gets brighter each day as it approaches the sun, but it falls lower in the sky, making it harder to spot.
“So you really need good binoculars to find it, and you need to know where to look,” said Paul Chodas, manager of NASA’s Near Earth Object Research Center.
The Nishimura object was discovered just a month before it was expected to pass through our solar system.
Japanese amateur astronomer Hideo Nishimura captured the eponymous comet while photographing the night sky on August 11th and 12th.
EarthSky reports that it was hiding in the sun’s glare until Nishimura spotted it in an image.
This is the third comet discovered by amateur astronomers.
Little is known about the comet, but experts theorize that Nishimura may be the source of the Sigma-Hyūd meteor shower, which lights up the night sky around December 9th to 12th each year. .
The ice globe itself was probably last visited 430 years ago, 10 to 20 years before Galileo invented the telescope.
