星空传媒

TORONTO -- Comet NEOWISE, a massive burning 鈥渋cy snowball,鈥� will be closest to the Earth Wednesday night, before its orbit begins to take it out into the solar system.

It will be another 6,000 years before it passes this way again.

The comet -- officially named C/2020 F3 NEOWISE using a formula for when it was discovered and the name of the infrared telescope that discovered it -- is more than a 100 million kilometres away.

The sun is responsible for the heavenly glow that has been visible from Earth with the naked eye for about 10 days. The solid, icy and rocky surface of the comet has got so hot that it has converted to gases, which glow bright and illuminate the debris that is falling off comet, creating a tail as it moves through the sky.

But as the comet continually moves further from the sun, it is cooling off, and those hot gases will dim.

But earthlings are lucky to have been able to spot the comet at all, according to astronomer Chris Vaughan, a member of the Royal Astronomical Society of Canada Toronto Centre.

Two other comets this year were supposed to have been as bright as this one but broke up as they neared the sun.

鈥淏ut this one survived and hasn鈥檛 disappointed.鈥�

, the comet is about five kilometres wide and was formed near the birth of the solar system 4.6 billion years ago.

It will be visible for several more weeks with binoculars and then telescopes and he hopes seeing the comet will spur a whole new generation of astronomy buffs.

鈥淚t鈥檚 a bucket list for sky watchers, who always hope to see a spectacular comet.鈥�

Brett Gladman, who holds a Canada Research Chair in planetary astronomy at the University of British Columbia, has been studying space for more than 30 years and he鈥檚 never before seen a comet with his naked eye.

He went to Vancouver鈥檚 Stanley Park to see NEOWISE a little over a week ago and then took pictures of it while on vacation in the interior of B.C.

鈥淚 was extremely pleased to see it,鈥� he said, and was especially thrilled with some pictures he got on his smartphone.

He鈥檚 tried to see comets before, including watching from a rooftop in Edmonton for Halley鈥檚 Comet in 1986, but it was too cloudy. 

Others that have travelled around the Earth since have been much more visible below the equator due to the planet鈥檚 orbit, he says. To see this one, says Gladman, get out into the darkest possible night sky at about 10:30 p.m. or 11 p.m. 

Mike Kukucska wasn鈥檛 sure he had captured the comet until he checked his Nikon鈥檚 viewfinder on July 13 at about 11:30 p.m. Sure enough, there it was, streaking over the idyllic barn in Dundas, Ont.

鈥淚t鈥檚 not that dark in Dundas, so I couldn鈥檛 really see it with my naked eye鈥� but it was quite exciting to see it on my camera.鈥�

Kukucska, who owns a set-designing and manufacturing company in Dundas, got into long-exposure photography when he fell in love with capturing the Milky Way. He鈥檚 been out every clear night since NEOWISE came into view about 10 days ago.

鈥淚 love to get an earthly subject in the foreground because I think that gives meaning to the heavenly objects in the sky.鈥�

Vaughan says take this opportunity to see a comet while you can because they are unpredictable and unscheduled.

鈥淵ou just never know the show it鈥檚 going to be.鈥�