News - March 2000

03/25/2000

12 SOHO comets received orbits and official designations. Only one comet is no member of the Kreutz group, C/1999 J6, which was discovered only recently in archival data (= SOHO-109). Following the designations and the names of the discoverers:
C/1999 J6 (SOHO) (M. Oates), C/1999 R4 (SOHO) (T. Lovejoy), C/1999 S5 (SOHO) (K. Schenk), C/1999 S6 (SOHO) (K. Schenk), C/1999 S7 (SOHO) (K. Schenk), C/1999 U5 (SOHO) (D. Biesecker), C/1999 W1 (SOHO) (D. Biesecker), C/1999 Y3 (SOHO) (A. Vourlidas), C/2000 B5 (SOHO) (D. Biesecker), C/2000 B6 (SOHO) (M. Meyer, T. Lovejoy, J. Shanklin, M. Oates), C/2000 B7 (SOHO) (M. Meyer, T. Lovejoy) and C/2000 D3 (SOHO) (M. Meyer, K. Cernis). (IAUC 7383, 7386, MPEC 2000-F09-12, F30-37)

03/10/2000

The sungrazer, discovered by Michael Oates two days before, received an orbit and the designation C/1999 E2 (SOHO).

03/08/2000

New Discovery!: Michael Oates has discovered a comet (SOHO-108) in archival data of the SOHO/LASCO C3 coronagraph of March 2, 1999. The probable Kreutz fragment comet has not yet been announced officially by the CBAT. (Sungrazer Homepage)

03/07/2000

New Discovery!: The on Mar. 04, 2000, discovered possible SOHO comet was confirmed by Doug Biesecker. The count is now up to 107. The comet became quite bright and showed a long and thin tail in C2 images. The orbit for comet C/2000 E1 (SOHO) shows that it is a member of the Kreutz group of sungrazing comets. (IAUC 7376, MPEC 2000-E27, Sungrazer Homepage)
Eight more SOHO discoveries of 1999 have received an orbit and a designation. Comet C/1999 O2 (SOHO) was discovered by Darren Lewis, C/1999 O3 (SOHO) by Terry Lovejoy, C/1999 P4 (SOHO) by Darren Lewis, C/1999 P5 (SOHO) by Angelos Vourlidas, C/1999 Q1 (SOHO) by Terry Lovejoy, C/1999 Q2 (SOHO) by Kevin Schenk, C/1999 Q3 (SOHO) by Doug Biesecker and C/1999 R3 (SOHO) by Kevin Schenk. All are members of the Kreutz group. (IAUC 7376, MPEC 2000-E28...35)

03/04/2000

Today a possible, relatively bright comet was discovered in SOHO/LASCO C3 images by Tim Harincar, Michael Oates, Michael Boschat and me (at about 12:00 UT). The comet displays a short tail and still has a way to go. Upon confirmation this will be SOHO-107. (Sungrazer Homepage)

03/02/2000

On Feb. 25, 2000, the LINEAR project discovered an asteroidal object which moves on a very cometary orbit. The 18^m asteroid 2000 DG₈ moves on a retrograde orbit with an inclination of about 129° and an eccentricity of about 0.8. The perihelion distance is about 2.2 AU and it orbits the sun in about 32.5 years. Until now no observer has reported a sign of cometary activity. (MPEC 2000-E07)

03/01/2000

New Discovery!: The LINEAR project discovered on Feb. 25, 2000, an asteroidal object which was identified as cometary by F. B. Zoltowski and by C. Hergenrother after posting the object on the NEO Confirmation Page. Comet C/2000 D2 (LINEAR) is the 43^rd comet discovered by LINEAR. The 17.5^m comet will pass its perihelion on Mar. 02, 2000, at about 2.3 AU. (IAUC 7372, MPEC 2000-E04)