Confirmations for Dec 2024 and Jan 2025
Hi All,
Later than planned, but here are all confirmations as of today. (I am assuming there won't be another 'January' comet discovered in the next few hours...)
5148 Nov30,24 21:04:48 J.Ruan C3,C2 Kreutz Dec01,24 5149 Dec01,24 10:28:48 E.Banach C2 Kreutz Dec01,24 5150 Dec01,24 11:21:40 Z.Xu C3,C2 Kreutz Dec01-02,24 5151 Dec01,24 13:10:52 E.Banach C2 Kreutz Dec01,24 5152 Dec02,24 04:27:40 E.Banach C2 Kreutz Dec02,24 5153* Dec02,24 10:27am Yang,Boonplod C2 Kreutz Dec02,24 5154 Dec02,24 19:06:36 J.Ruan C3,C2 Kreutz Dec02-03,24 5155* Dec03,24 06:16am M.Kaszczyk C2 Kreutz Dec03,24 5156 Dec03,24 11:01:27 Z.Yang C2 Kreutz Dec03,24 5157 Dec03,24 22:27:40 W.Boonplod C2 Kreutz Dec03-04,24 5158 Dec06,24 00:28:48 E.Banach C2 Kreutz Dec06,24 5159 Dec06,24 03:31:29 J.Ruan C2 Kreutz Dec06,24 5160 Dec08,24 12:06:52 E.Banach C2 Kreutz Dec08,24 5161 Dec12,24 22:47:56 Z.Xu C3,C2 Kreutz Dec12-13,24 5162 Dec18,24 19:08:59 H.Tan C3,C2 Kreutz Dec18-19,24 5163 Dec21,24 12:35:36 H.Tan C3,C2 Kreutz Dec21-22,24 5164 Dec23,24 20:01:41 H.Tan C3,C2 Kreutz Dec24-25,24 5165 Dec25,24 16:11:06 H.Tan C3,C2 Kreutz Dec25-26,24 5166 Dec29,24 08:30:18 W.Boonplod C2 Kreutz Dec29,24 5167 Dec30,24 11:44:07 Z.Xu C3,C2 Kreutz Dec30-31,24 5168 Dec30,24 21:32:33 Z.Xu C2 Kreutz Dec31,24 5169 Jan01,25 09:47:25 Z.Xu C3,C2 Kreutz Jan01,25 5170 Jan03,25 02:07:26 J.Ruan C3,C2 Kreutz Jan03,25 5171 Jan13,25 02:12:09 J.Ruan C3 Kreutz Jan13,25 5172 Jan15,25 18:42:11 W.Boonplod C3 Kreutz Jan15,25 5173 Jan21,25 16:58:07 W.Boonplod C3 Kreutz Jan21,25 5174 Jan22,25 19:42:56 J.Ruan C3 Kreutz Jan22,25 5175 Jan25,25 04:08:19 J.Ruan C3,C2 Meyer Jan25,25 5176 Jan27,25 19:34:24 R.Pickard C3 Kreutz Jan27,25 --
5153 = MSG 5878
5155 = MSG 5886
There is a report (# 5884) on the chat group from Yanxi Li that I cannot confirm. I do not see anything at all at, or near, the given positions. If I am missing something, please email me and let me know. I also cannot confirm Trygve's report from Dec08,24, and Jiangao's C3 report from Dec28,24. Finally, Worachate's report from Jan13,25 was the same comet as Jiangao reported earlier that day (#5171).
Project Statistics
It has been a while since I updated this, so now seems to be a good time. Last year, there were 186 new SOHO comet discoveries, which is actually the fewest we have had since 2009! Though I should note that in 2016 there were 187 discoveries, so that's a statistical tie.
Here's a simple bar chart showing the annual discoveries since the SOHO mission started:
In the very early mission (1998-2001), the data was very 'uneven', with lots of different data rates and image sizes. This made it harder to find comets. That improved a little around 2002. Then in 2012, SOHO changed its operating mode, and LASCO gained extra images. That led to an obvious increase in discoveries, mostly because the faintest C2 comets could now be seen in 5+ images and thus could be confirmed. Otherwise, the numbers have remained very consistent over the past few years. I know it looks like there's a slight downward trend over the past few years, but I don't know that we can read too much into that. I think we would expect variations like this with such an extended debris stream as we see with the Kreutz group. I would want to watch these statistics for 20-30 years before reading too much into them.
In terms of relative percentages of each comet type, the breakdown has not changed much. The discoveries break down as:
- Kreutz: 85.2%
- Meyer: 7.0%
- Kracht: 1.0%
- KrachtII: 0.3%
- Marsden: 1.5%
- Non-Group: 5.0%
The Kreutz comets of course still dominate, but the Meyer group is a substantial portion of the project discoveries. So once I again I will take the opportunity to thank all of you for your continued contributions to this incredibly valuable, and entirely unique, astronomical data set! You are all part of an amazing team effort, and it continues to be a privilege for me to be a part of your team, and to work with you all.
As always, please email me with questions, comments, complaints, concerns, etc.
Karl