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Comet 12P/Pons-Brooks visits the inner solar system just once every 71 years, making it a once-in-a-lifetime viewing event for most of us. It will make its closest approach to Earth in June, but it will be at its brightest and easiest to spot when it makes its closest approach to the sun on April 21. It should be visible any time from now through to early April, and your best change of viewing it is from a location with clear, dark skies.
Recommended Videos That does coincide with the date of the solar eclipse, on April 8, but it’ll be difficult to pick out the comet during the eclipse itself. Instead, you’ll be best off doing a cosmic doubleheader by enjoying the eclipse during the day, then going comet hunting that night. It’ll be tough, but not impossible to see the comet with the naked eye, so if you’re determined to spot it, you might want to get out a telescope or binoculars. “Don’t expect it to be dazzlingly bright — the kind of image you see in photographs. It’s not going to be like that,” said Dr Robert Massey, deputy executive director at the Royal Astronomical Society.
Related This type of comet is known as a Devil Comet because it has a pointy, horn-shaped appearance. Comets have their distinctive tails because they contain ice, which melts and is released as gas as they approach the sun. This particular comet is a type called a cryovolcanic comet, which experiences eruptions of dust and gas from the buildup of pressure. These eruptions give the comet its horned appearance, and because it contains a molecule called diatomic carbon, it also glows green.
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