- Israel, Hezbollah must both 'stop firing': Blinken
- Barcola leads PSG to win over Rennes
- Why South America is burning
- AC Milan join Torino at Serie A summit by thumping Lecce
- Maduro's hold on power 'unsustainable': Venezuelan opposition leader to AFP
- Guinea's Guirassy sparks Dortmund comeback win over plucky Bochum
- Brazil coach urges patience over Neymar return
- Hurricane John causes at least five deaths, floods in Mexico's Acapulco
- Trump vows to prosecute Google for showing 'bad' stories on him
- Europe en route for Moon with new simulator, says astronaut Pesquet
- Livingstone stars as England thrash Australia to square ODI series
- Hezbollah's Nasrallah: powerful leader living in hiding
- Austria far right eyes historic victory in tight polls
- Fireworks forecast if comet survives risky Sun flypast
- New York mayor pleads not guilty to shock corruption charges
- Livingstone runs riot as England make 312-5 against Australia
- Hurricane triggers 'catastrophic' US floods, 17 dead
- 'Here to weep': French pay tribute to murdered student
- Van Gogh's 'Sunflowers' targeted again with soup in UK after activists jailed
- Wimbledon given green light for controversial expansion plan
- IPL's Modi blasts cricket's Hundred as 'big fat Ponzi scheme'
- Israel says strikes Hezbollah HQ in Beirut
- Trump and Zelensky make nice after tensions over Ukraine war
- Van Gogh 'Sunflowers' in new soup protest after activists jailed
- Significant deaths in cycle racing
- Argentina judge orders dictionary to delete pejorative definition of 'Jewish'
- Sudan paramilitary attack kills 18 at El-Fasher market: medic
- Maggie Smith, British theatre and cinema legend
- Arsenal boss Arteta still 'loves' Guardiola despite fiery clash
- Swiss teenage cyclist Muriel Furrer dies after crash at worlds
- Spurs skipper Son in race to recover from injury for Man Utd clash
- Veteran British actor Maggie Smith dies aged 89: family
- 'Honest' Maresca keeping Chelsea stars happy
- New York mayor in court to face corruption charges
- US Fed's preferred inflation measure edges down in August
- Climate activists jailed for throwing soup at Van Gogh's 'Sunflowers'
- S.African woman turns 118, among the oldest in the world
- Man City's Rodri to miss rest of season with ACL injury
- Hurricane leaves millions without power, four dead in southeast US
- Ireland fines Meta 91 mn euros over EU data breach
- Taken from mother by nuns, victim finds solace in pope Belgium visit
- Stranded cruise ship passengers bid bitter-sweet farewell to Belfast
- 18 dead in Sudan's El-Fasher after paramilitary attack on market: medic
- UK clears $4 bn AI partnership between Amazon, Anthropic
- Barca fans barred from Champions League away game over racist banner
- 60 'survivors' accuse ex-Harrods boss Al-Fayed of sex abuse: lawyers
- Maneskin's Damiano David releases first solo song
- US returns to Iran latest batch of ancient clay tablets
- Trump to meet Zelensky after tensions over Ukraine war
- US officials warn weakening storm Helene still 'dangerous'
Fireworks forecast if comet survives risky Sun flypast
A comet is expected to risk having its tail clipped on Friday by flying perilously close to the Sun, promising fireworks next month should it survive the fraught flypast.
Astronomers believe the Tsuchinshan-ATLAS comet has been hurtling headfirst through the void of space towards the centre of the Solar System for millions of years.
Named for the Chinese observatory and South African programme which detected and confirmed its existence in 2023, the ball of rock and ice may have formed at a distance up to 400,000 times that between Earth and the Sun, models suggest.
Up till now, you had to be in the southern hemisphere to hope to see it with the naked eye.
But on Friday evening it is projected to cross as close to the Sun as it will get, before returning towards Earth.
From October 13 the comet will be visible in the northern hemisphere.
If the weather is right "it will jump to the eye" every night "in the direction of the setting sun", astronomer Lucie Maquet at the Paris Observatory told AFP.
- 'A brilliant comet' -
But that forecast assumes the comet does not fly too close to the Sun.
When comets approach our star, the melting ice contained at their core lets out a long trail of dust which reflects sunlight.
This characteristic tail is also the sign the comet is degassing. If the Sun affects the comet too much, it risks disintegrating.
As the cluster of frozen water and rock "may not resist the force of the Sun's gravity", a catastrophe "is always possible", Maquet said.
The good news is that the comet, officially named "C/2023 A3" by scientists, seems to have a rather massive core.
So "there's a good chance it will survive" its sunny pass-by, the astronomer said.
Initial forecasts predicting the comet would be especially bright as it visited our skies have since been revised down.
"But it will certainly be a brilliant comet," Maquet said.
- Unpredictable future -
The comet's future course is unpredictable.
Its solar sojourn will not be without consequences on its voyage, disturbed by the gravitational pull of the celestial objects it has crossed and by the weightloss inflicted by the Sun's harsh rays.
According to the models of The Paris Observatory's Institute of Celestial Mechanics, it could be "ejected from the solar system and lost among the stars".
All depends on the encounters the comet makes on its journey through the Oort cloud -- a frigid belt of tiny objects theorised to exist at the far end of the Solar System up to 3.2 light-years away -- in a few thousand years' time.
It would be enough, Maquet said, for the comet to pass by an object "that deflects it enough for a return trip to the Solar System".
B.Godinho--PC