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Comet Lovejoy’s Tail

-- | December 19, 2011

Question: I just saw the photos of comet Lovejoy and its wiggly tail on spaceweather.com. It appears the tail is pointed toward the sun. Can you explain this? I thought the solar wind always drew the tail away from the sun.

Answer: I think that the tail is being accented by its passage through the solar plasma (in fact, the text following the image of Lovejoy emerging from the limb of the Sun suggests as much).  As the description on spaceweather.com suggests, this accentuation of the comet tail could be due to buffeting by plasma waves or to magnetic loops which permeate the solar atmosphere.  I hope that this answers your question.  Please let me know if you have further questions.

Jeff Mangum