C/2017 E4 (Lovejoy)

DISINTEGRATED

Type: Periodic Perihelion date: 23 April 2017 Perihelion distance (q): 0.5 Aphelion distance (Q) : 951 Period (years): 10,375 Eccentricity (e): 1.00 Inclination (i): 88.2 JPL orbit diagram COBS lightcurve Terry Lovejoy discovered a 15th magnitude comet in images taken with his 0.36m f1.9 Schmidt-Cassegrain on 9 March 2017. The comet was soon shown to be significantly brighter than indicated by the CCD observations, with Juan Jose Gonzalez estimating it at 8.6 in his 0.2m SCT on 20 March. The comet was intrinsically faint and having reached 7th magnitude did not survive perihelion. Observations (VEMag = visual equivalent magnitude) Date 10x10 mag Error VEmag Coma ' 02-Apr-17 11.03 0.02 7.1 6.7