C/2014 E2 (Jacques)
Long-period comet
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
C/2014 E2 (Jacques), provisionally designated as S002692,[3] is a long-period comet discovered by the Brazilian astronomers Cristóvão Jacques Lage de Faria, Eduardo Pimentel, João Ribeiro de Barros and Marcelo Dias on the night of 13 March 2014.[4] It was the second comet discovered by the SONEAR Observatory team after comet C/2014 A4.
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Eduardo Pimentel
João Ribeiro de Barros
Marcelo Dias
Image of 2014 E2 (Jacques) in 24 August 2014 | |
| Discovery | |
|---|---|
| Discovered by | Cristóvão Jacques Eduardo Pimentel João Ribeiro de Barros Marcelo Dias |
| Discovery date | 13 March 2014 |
| Orbital characteristics[1] | |
| Epoch | 2014 May 23.0 TT (JD 2456800.5) |
| Aphelion | ~1600 AU (epoch 1950)[2] |
| Perihelion | 0.6638 AU (q) |
| Eccentricity | 0.99912 (e) |
| Orbital period | ~22,000 years inbound (Barycentric solution for epoch 1950)[2] ~12,000 years outbound (Barycentric solution for epoch 2050)[2] |
| Avg. orbital speed | 27 km/s |
| Max. orbital speed | 51.7 km/s |
| Inclination | 156.4° (i) |
| Last perihelion | 2014 July 2 |
Overview
Observations were made with a 0.45-meter (17.7-inch) f/2.9 wide-field reflector telescope with equatorial assembly and CCD camera at the Southern Observatory for Near Earth Asteroids Research (SONEAR), located near Oliveira, Minas Gerais, Brazil.[5]
In late March 2014, C/2014 E2 (Jacques) appeared to contain a dense, bright coma (11.5-12 magnitude), visible with an 8-inch telescope.[5] It crossed the celestial equator on 8 May 2014 becoming a Northern Hemisphere object.[6] From 3 June 2014 until 17 July 2014 it had an elongation less than 30 degrees from the Sun.[6] The comet was visible in LASCO C3 on 21 June 2014.[7] C/2014 E2 peaked around apparent magnitude 6 in mid-July and was visible in binoculars above the glow of morning twilight.[8][9]
C/2014 E2 passed 0.085 AU (12,700,000 km; 7,900,000 mi) from Venus on 13 July 2014.[10] On 20 July 2014 the comet was near the naked eye star Beta Tauri.[11] On 22 August 2014 it passed Epsilon Cassiopeiae. It reached perigee (closest approach to Earth) on 28 August 2014, at 0.56 AU (84,000,000 km; 52,000,000 mi).[3] The comet passed about 3 degrees from Deneb from 4–5 September 2014.[12] On 14 September the comet was near Albireo.[13]
By October 2014 the comet had fainted to magnitude 10.[14]
