A gigantic comet about half the size of the Sun and five times bigger than Jupiter will light up the night skies by the end of April.
Atlas, the massive comet, is currently close to the orbit of Mars and will make its closest approach to our planet this month.
It will potentially become the ‘comet of a generation’ and one of the brightest objects in the night skies.
The gaseous envelope surrounding Atlas has swollen in diameter to 447,387 miles since it was discovered in December. For comparison, the Sun has a diameter of 865,370 miles, the Earth has 7,917 miles, and Jupiter has 86,881 miles.
Atlas poses no danger to Earth as its closest point will be over 72 million miles away but the comet will still be very bright and can be seen by the naked eye.
“Comet 17P/Holmes partially exploded and, for a while, had an atmosphere even larger than the sun,” SpaceWeatherArchive reported.
“The Great Comet of 1811 also had a sun-sized coma. Whether Comet ATLAS will eventually rival those behemoths of the past remains to be seen.”
The Asteroid Terrestrial-impact Last Alert System (ATLAS) in Hawaii discovered the comet on December 28, 2019 and named it after its initials.
When it was discovered, Atlas comet was still faint and a telescope was needed. But it can now be seen with binoculars as it comes closer to Earth.
In an interview with The Times, astronomy expert Daniel Brown said: “It’s definitely a promising comet. It’s pushing towards a level that by the end of April could look really, really stunning.”
Atlas, which emits a stunning green glow, is currently the biggest ‘green object’ in the Solar System.
“As they get closer to the sun they gas off this material and we get this amazing display, Brown told the Times,” Brown added. “It’s already at a level of brightness that you can see through binoculars — this beautiful greenish halo around it and a bit of development of the tail.”
Astronomer Matthijs Burgmeijer also said: “How bright will it get? the estimates are from a conservative magnitude +2 (visible to the naked eye) to a spectacular magnitude -11 which would make the comet the brightest comet since records began.
“We simply have to wait and see how it will develop over the coming weeks. Comets are notoriously unpredictable. Like Comet Ison some years ago that also had promising characteristics but disintegrated before it could give a good show.”
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