The non-group stargazer comet as seen by SOHO. (Credit: NASA)

Chuck Bednar for redOrbit.com @BednarChuck

An unusual comet was spotted by the NASA/ESA Solar and Heliospheric Observatory (SOHO) as it travelled near the sun late last week, and unlike most other comets that make such a voyage, this one actually lived to tell the tale.

According to the US space agency, these types of comets are known as sungrazers and typically evaporate in the intense sunlight. However, this recently spotted comet made it to within 2.2 million miles of the sun and was actually able to survive the journey intact.

[STORY: Sungrazing comet: wrong place, wrong time]

Thats not the only thing about the comet that caught NASAs attention, though. Not only was it a sungrazer, it is what is known as a non-group comet, meaning that it does not belong to any known family of comets. The majority of comets observed by SOHO are members of the Kreutz family, all of which had separated from the same giant comet centuries ago.

Comet me bro!

Theres a half-decent chance that ground observers might be able to detect it in the coming weeks, explained Karl Battams, a solar scientist at the Naval Research Lab in Washington, DC. But its also possible that events during its trip around, the sun will cause it to die fairly fast.

Since it first launched in 1995, SOHO has discovered 2,875 comets, making it the pre-eminent comet-locating spacecraft of all time, according to NASA. However, it observed only a handful of non-group comets (such as this new one) each year, the agency added.

The Sungrazer Project explains that these types of comets have been observed for hundreds of years, dating back at least to the late 1880s. There is no formal definition of what a sungrazing comet is, and to date no comet has ever been seen hitting the photosphere (or solar surface). The closest sungrazers typically come pass within 50,000 kilometers of the sun.

Originally posted here:

Unusual sungrazer comet passes near sun and survives