The Watchers- by Adonai on
Comet ISON is now 74 million km away from the Sun and 129 million km away from the Earth. It's closest approach to the Sun is on November 28, 2013 at 18:44 UTC.
It is still unclear what exploded from the ISON's core on November 14th but it created a spectacularly-long tail which is now more than 16 million kilometers. Take a look at its image taken by Michael Jäger on November 17th at SpaceWeather.
The animation below consists of 8 images, each a 3-image median combine stack, all with a r' filter, from 11:43 to 12:53 UTC, November 14, made by Bruce Gary using a Celestron 11-inch telescope. Filamentary structure can be seen moving away from the sun at high speed. The motion of jets that can be seen first on the side is backwards and toward the center of the tail.
Animation credit: Bruce Gary
You are invited to read more on ISON : http://thewatchers.adorraeli.com/2013/09/17/updates-on-approaching-comet-c-2012-s1-ison/
