SOHO Discovers that a Sungrazing Comet Survived Its Trip Around the Sun (VIDEO)

First Posted: Feb 25, 2015 10:19 AM EST

A certain comet has survived what could have been a fatal encounter with the sun. Although the comet skimmed past our nearest star on Feb. 18 to 21, it managed to continue on its way relatively intact.

The comet itself was spotted by NASA's Solar and Heliospheric Observatory (SOHO). It's actually interesting for two reasons. First, it's what is called a non-group comet, which means that it's not part of any known family of comets. Most comets seen by SOHO belong to the Kreutz family, all of which broke off from a single giant comet centuries ago.

The second reason why this comet is so fascinating is because it actually survived. Most comets that skim by the sun near enough to be seen by SOHO usually break apart. Known as sungrazers, these comets often evaporate in the intense sunlight.

In this case, the comet made it to within 2.2 million miles of the sun's surface. It's also likely that the comet will be able to be seen in telescopes in the coming weeks.

"There's a half-decent chance that ground observers might be able to detect it in the coming weeks," said Karl Battams, a solar scientist at the Naval Research Lab. "But it's also possible that events during its trip around the sun will cause it to die fairly fast."

SOHO has become the number one comet finder of all time since it was launched in 1995. In fact, this latest comet is just one of 2,875 that the instrument has found. However, SOHO sees only non-group comets like this once a year. Fortunately, it also managed to capture a video of the comet during its journey around the sun. You can actually see that the comet begins to develop a tail, which is due to the extreme heat. While the comet develops a tail, the sun also releases a coronal mass ejection at the same time (CME).

Want to see the comet for yourself? Check out the video below, courtesy of YouTube.