1,580 days away
Dominic Ford, Editor
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Comet 26P/Grigg-Skjellerup will make its closest approach to the Sun on 20 March, at a distance of 1.08 AU.
From Fairfield on the day of perihelion it will be visible in the dawn sky, rising at 02:55 (EST) – 3 hours and 58 minutes before the Sun – and reaching an altitude of 22° above the south-eastern horizon before fading from view as dawn breaks at around 05:48.
The events that comprise the 2029 apparition of 26P/Grigg-Skjellerup are as follows:
| Date | Event |
| 20 Mar 2029 | Comet 26P/Grigg-Skjellerup passes perihelion |
The table below lists the times when 26P/Grigg-Skjellerup will be visible from Fairfield day-by-day through its apparition:
| Date | Constellation | Comet visibility |
| 27 Feb 2029 | Scorpius | Not observable |
| 01 Mar 2029 | Scorpius | Not observable |
| 03 Mar 2029 | Scorpius | Not observable |
| 05 Mar 2029 | Scorpius | Not observable |
| 07 Mar 2029 | Scorpius | Not observable |
| 09 Mar 2029 | Sagittarius | Not observable |
| 11 Mar 2029 | Sagittarius | Not observable |
| 13 Mar 2029 | Sagittarius | Not observable |
| 15 Mar 2029 | Sagittarius | Not observable |
| 17 Mar 2029 | Sagittarius | Not observable |
| 19 Mar 2029 | Sagittarius | Not observable |
| 21 Mar 2029 | Sagittarius | Visible from 05:36 until 05:47 Highest at 05:47, 23° above SE horizon |
| 23 Mar 2029 | Sagittarius | Visible from 05:22 until 05:43 Highest at 05:43, 24° above SE horizon |
| 25 Mar 2029 | Sagittarius | Visible from 05:09 until 05:39 Highest at 05:39, 25° above SE horizon |
| 27 Mar 2029 | Sagittarius | Visible from 04:57 until 05:36 Highest at 05:36, 27° above SE horizon |
| 29 Mar 2029 | Sagittarius | Visible from 04:46 until 05:32 Highest at 05:32, 28° above SE horizon |
| 31 Mar 2029 | Sagittarius | Visible from 04:35 until 05:29 Highest at 05:29, 29° above SE horizon |
| 02 Apr 2029 | Aquila | Visible from 04:25 until 05:25 Highest at 05:25, 30° above SE horizon |
| 04 Apr 2029 | Aquila | Visible from 04:15 until 05:22 Highest at 05:22, 31° above SE horizon |
| 06 Apr 2029 | Aquila | Visible from 04:05 until 05:18 Highest at 05:18, 32° above SE horizon |
| 08 Apr 2029 | Aquila | Visible from 03:56 until 05:14 Highest at 05:14, 33° above SE horizon |
A more detailed table of 26P/Grigg-Skjellerup's position on each night is available here. A diagram of the orbit of 26P/Grigg-Skjellerup is available here.
Finder chart
The chart below shows the path of 26P/Grigg-Skjellerup over the course of its apparition, as calculated from the orbital elements published by the Minor Planet Center (MPC). It is available for download, either on dark background, in PNG, PDF or SVG formats, or on a light background, in PNG, PDF or SVG formats. It was produced using StarCharter.
Comet brightnesses
Comets are intrinsically highly unpredictable objects, since their brightness depends on the scattering of sunlight from dust particles in the comet's coma and tail. This dust is continually streaming away from the comet's nucleus, and its density at any particular time is governed by the rate of sublimation of the ice in the comet's nucleus, as it is heated by the Sun's rays. It also depends on the amount of dust that is mixed in with that ice. This is very difficult to predict in advance, and can be highly variable even between successive apparitions of the same comet.
In consequence, while the future positions of comets are usually known with a high degree of confidence, their future brightnesses are not. For most comets, we do not publish any magnitude estimates at all. For the few comets where we do make estimates, we generally prefer the BAA's magnitude parameters to those published by the Minor Planet Center, since they are typically updated more often.
No estimate for the brightness of comet 26P/Grigg-Skjellerup is currently available.
The comet's position at perihelion will be:
| Object | Right Ascension | Declination | Constellation | Magnitude |
| Comet 26P/Grigg-Skjellerup | 18h36m40s | 21°55'S | Sagittarius | 11.2 |
The coordinates are given in J2000.0.
The sky on 20 Mar 2029
| The sky on 20 March 2029 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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29% 5 days old |
All times shown in EDT.
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Source
This event was automatically generated on the basis of orbital elements published by the Minor Planet Center (MPC) , and is updated whenever new elements become available. It was last updated on 19 Oct 2024.
Image credit
© Andy Roberts 1997. Pictured comet is C/1995 O1 Hale-Bopp.