Lovejoy Lives! Comet Survives Solar Encounter

You would have been very optimistic if, before Comet Lovejoy's apparent suicidal near-miss of the sun's surface, you'd placed a bet on the icy interloper's survival. But if you did, you'd be laughing all the way to the bank.

This is why I don't gamble -- I was anything but optimistic of the chances the Kreutz Sungrazing comet -- officially designated as C/2011 W3 (Lovejoy) -- would live through the hellish temperatures it endured as it made the death-defying solar dive.

But as NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO) watched the comet emerge from the other side of the sun Thursday evening, Comet Lovejoy proved the doubters wrong and continued its orbit after passing only 87,000 miles above the sun's photosphere. In doing so, it had endured temperatures of over a million degrees Celsius.

Watch the video of the lucky comet zooming away from the limb of the sun:


"Breaking News! Lovejoy lives! The comet Lovejoy has survived it's journey around the sun to reemerge on the other side," exclaimed the SDO's Twitter feed after seeing the singed comet race away from our nearest star.

It goes to show that, in space, you can never take anything for granted.
(nasa discovery)