Astroblog: Comet Elenin in STEREO H1B (August 21 and 22)

Saturday, August 27, 2011

Comet Elenin in STEREO H1B (August 21 and 22)

Elenin passes through the image field of view of the STEREO H1 Behind imager on August 21. Click to embiggen. Image processed from NASA/STEREO raw images using ImageJ. Inverted image, dark lines are imaging artifacts.

Elenin passes through the image field of view of the STEREO H1 Behind imager on August 22. Click to embiggen. Image processed from NASA/STEREO raw images using ImageJ. Inverted image, dark lines are imaging artifacts.

As with the previous post I've zoomed and cropped these images of Comet Elenin from the STEREO H1B imager in order to capture the tail of Elenin. Presenting the images this way makes the tail easier to see. On the 21st another solar flare passed over Elenin, but the effects weren't so dramatic this time. Elenin does seem to be fading more, but I need to calibrate the images to be sure. Mercury is now in the field of view, and an asteroid on the 21st (there is lots more on the larger images, an the 23rd has a couple more coming through). Here's the AVI animation of the August 21 images (1 Mb) and the AVI animation of the August 22 images (1 Mb).

Labels: comet, Stereo comet astronomy, Stereo Satellite