Halley’s Comet is one of the most famous elements in the universe. It orbits the Sun every 75 years, and is the only “short period” comet that is visible from Earth, and also the only comet that a person can see twice in his lifetime. For this reason, there are many references about him. Its name is due to Edmund Halley, who calculated its orbit in the early 18th century.
It is not known for sure when Halley’s Comet was first observed since there is evidence of it in Chinese and Babylonian writings , but at that time they were not recognized as occurrences of the comet. The most widely accepted theory is that the first observation took place in 239 BC.
Comet Halley: features and parts
In the same way as the rest of kites, it is made up of three parts:
- Core: Halley’s Comet is peanut-shaped and measures 15 kilometers long x 8 kilometers high and 8 kilometers wide. The core is coated with a layer of powder.
- Coma: the cloud of gas and dust around the nucleus is known as such. It occurs when the surface heats up as it approaches the Sun. It can extend 100 kilometers around the comet.
- Tail: It extends more than 100 million kilometers in space. Gas is made up of 80% water vapor, 16% carbon monoxide, 3% carbon dioxide, and 1% hydrocarbons.
Last appearance of Halley’s Comet
The last time Halley’s Comet was visible from Earth was in 1986. A milestone in human history as it became the first comet to be observed by spacecraft in detail. These observations supported a large number of hypotheses about the comet’s creation, especially Fred Lawrence Whipple’s “dirty snowball” model.
When will the next one be?
This 2021 it is more than 5,000 million kilometers away from the Sun and the Earth , in the Constellation Hydra. He will return in a long time, in the year 2061.
Due to popular culture, the passage of Halley’s Comet has always been associated with catastrophes . In 1910 it was baptized as the “comet of the end of the world.” There were numerous cases of mass hysteria, many churches opened to receive people who wanted to confess and many suicides occurred.
