A Christmas comet for Solar Orbiter

Paris (ESA) Dec 27, 2021

Comet Leonard, a mass of space dust, rock and ice about a kilometre across is heading for a close pass of the Sun on 3 January, and the ESA/NASA Solar Orbiter spacecraft has been watching its evolution over the last days. The Solar Orbiter Heliospheric Imager (SoloHI) captured an animated sequence of images 17-19 December that shows comet Leonard streaking diagonally across the field of vi