{"id":17201,"date":"2025-10-22T04:17:17","date_gmt":"2025-10-22T04:17:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/17201\/"},"modified":"2025-10-22T04:17:17","modified_gmt":"2025-10-22T04:17:17","slug":"green-comet-to-fly-over-california-wont-be-seen-again-for-1000-years","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/17201\/","title":{"rendered":"Green comet to fly over California, won’t be seen again for 1,000 years"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\t\t\t\t\t\tA newly discovered comet is about to make its closest pass to Earth on Tuesday night. It should be visible over the Central Coast before it disappears \u2014 and won\u2019t be seen again for more than a thousand years.Comet C\/2025 A6 (Lemmon) is named after the Mount Lemmon Survey near Tucson, Arizona, where it was first identified by scientists on Jan. 3. Though it was joined in the night sky by another \u201ccosmic snowball\u201d called Comet SWAN on Monday, that comet is expected to grow dimmer as the days go by. Meanwhile, experts are calling Comet Lemmon the best and brightest comet to view from Earth this year.To see it, head to a dark location as far away from city lights as possible, about 45 minutes to an hour after sunset, Gerald McKeegan, an adjunct astronomer at Chabot Space and Science Center in Oakland, told SFGATE in an email. It should briefly appear low in the western sky, about 55 million miles away from Earth. Though it may be visible to the naked eye, you\u2019ll have a much better chance of seeing it using binoculars, he said.That said, the first atmospheric river of the season may put a damper on viewing as the storm is projected to sweep through the Bay Area on Friday. \u201cUnfortunately for stargazers, we are expecting clouds to return tomorrow night as onshore flow increases,\u201d Roger Gass, a meteorologist for the National Weather Service\u2019s Bay Area office, told SFGATE on Monday. The good news is you\u2019ll have plenty of opportunities to try again. Comet Lemmon should be around through Nov. 3 and become slightly brighter around Oct. 26 or 27 as it makes its elliptical orbit around the Sun, McKeegan said. After that, it won\u2019t return to the inner solar system for \u201cat least 1,300 years,\u201d he said. \u201cThis will be the only chance to see this comet.\u201d Similar to the green comet that stunned local stargazers back in 2023, Lemmon\u2019s shamrock-colored hue comes from the unique breakdown of different types of ice that make up its body. As it nears the sun, that ice changes from a solid to a gas.\u201cDepending on the composition of the ices in the comet, that gas can appear green,\u201d he said. \u201cIt is also common to see comets that appear blue or white, with occasional hints of other colors.\u201dWhile you\u2019re looking up, you might catch a glimpse of Saturn \u2014 look for the bright star in the southeastern sky around 8:30 p.m., and if you have a pair of binoculars handy, you may even see its rings. The Orionid meteor shower is also expected to reach its peak on Tuesday night, but don\u2019t expect too much of a show \u2014 it only produces about 20 meteors per hour, McKeegan said.\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n

A newly discovered comet<\/a> is about to make its closest pass to Earth on Tuesday night. It should be visible over the Central Coast before it disappears \u2014 and won\u2019t be seen again for more than a thousand years.<\/p>\n

\t\t\"18<\/p>\n

Comet C\/2025 A6 (Lemmon) is named after the Mount Lemmon Survey near Tucson, Arizona, where it was first identified by scientists on Jan. 3. Though it was joined in the night sky by another \u201ccosmic snowball\u201d called Comet SWAN<\/a> on Monday, that comet is expected to grow dimmer as the days go by. Meanwhile, experts are calling<\/a> Comet Lemmon the best and brightest comet to view from Earth this year.<\/p>\n

To see it, head to a dark location as far away from city lights as possible, about 45 minutes to an hour after sunset, Gerald McKeegan, an adjunct astronomer at Chabot Space and Science Center in Oakland, told SFGATE in an email. It should briefly appear low in the western sky, about 55 million miles<\/a> away from Earth. <\/p>\n

Though it may be visible to the naked eye, you\u2019ll have a much better chance of seeing it using binoculars, he said.<\/p>\n

That said, the first atmospheric river of the season<\/a> may put a damper on viewing as the storm is projected to sweep through the Bay Area on Friday. <\/p>\n

\u201cUnfortunately for stargazers, we are expecting clouds to return tomorrow night as onshore flow increases,\u201d Roger Gass, a meteorologist for the National Weather Service\u2019s Bay Area office, told SFGATE on Monday. <\/p>\n

The good news is you\u2019ll have plenty of opportunities to try again. Comet Lemmon should be around through Nov. 3 and become slightly brighter around Oct. 26 or 27 as it makes its elliptical orbit around the Sun, McKeegan said. <\/p>\n

After that, it won\u2019t return to the inner solar system for \u201cat least 1,300 years,\u201d he said. \u201cThis will be the only chance to see this comet.\u201d <\/p>\n

Similar to the green comet<\/a> that stunned local stargazers back in 2023, Lemmon\u2019s shamrock-colored hue comes from the unique breakdown of different types of ice that make up its body. As it nears the sun, that ice changes from a solid to a gas.<\/p>\n

\u201cDepending on the composition of the ices in the comet, that gas can appear green,\u201d he said. \u201cIt is also common to see comets that appear blue or white, with occasional hints of other colors.\u201d<\/p>\n

While you\u2019re looking up, you might catch a glimpse of Saturn \u2014 look for the bright star in the southeastern sky around 8:30 p.m., and if you have a pair of binoculars handy, you may even see its rings. The Orionid meteor shower is also expected to reach its peak on Tuesday night, but don\u2019t expect too much of a show \u2014 it only produces about 20 meteors per hour, McKeegan said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A newly discovered comet is about to make its closest pass to Earth on Tuesday night. It should…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":17202,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[14793,184,14792,7,9,8,10490,6235,14789,14790,2882,2871,14788,1024,675,10493,14791,72],"class_list":{"0":"post-17201","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-california","8":"tag-adjunct-astronomer","9":"tag-bay-area","10":"tag-binocular","11":"tag-california","12":"tag-california-headlines","13":"tag-california-news","14":"tag-comet","15":"tag-earth","16":"tag-gerald-mckeegan","17":"tag-green-comet","18":"tag-hour","19":"tag-ice","20":"tag-lemmon","21":"tag-monday","22":"tag-sfgate","23":"tag-stargazer","24":"tag-sun","25":"tag-year"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17201","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=17201"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17201\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/17202"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17201"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17201"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=17201"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}