46P/Wirtanen
Wirtanen at perihelion on 12 December 2018 | |
| Discovery | |
|---|---|
| Discovered by | Carl A. Wirtanen |
| Discovery site | Lick Observatory |
| Discovery date | 17 January 1948 |
| Designations | |
| P/1948 A1, P/1954 R2 | |
| |
| Orbital characteristics | |
| Epoch | 13 September 2023 (JD 2460200.5) |
| Observation arc | 75.89 years |
| Number of observations | 7,527 |
| Aphelion | 5.127 AU |
| Perihelion | 1.055 AU |
| Semi-major axis | 3.091 AU |
| Eccentricity | 0.65867 |
| Orbital period | 5.43 years |
| Inclination | 11.749° |
| 82.164° | |
| Argument of periapsis | 356.33° |
| Mean anomaly | 314.77° |
| Last perihelion | 19 May 2024 |
| Next perihelion | 27 October 2029 |
| TJupiter | 2.818 |
| Earth MOID | 0.071 AU |
| Jupiter MOID | 0.169 AU |
| Physical characteristics | |
Mean radius | 0.6 km (0.37 mi) |
| 7.9 hours 9.18 ± 0.05 hours | |
| |
| Comet total magnitude (M1) | 16.6 |
| Perihelion distance at different epochs | |||||||
| Epoch | Perihelion (AU) | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1967 | 1.61 | ||||||
| 1974 | 1.26 | ||||||
| 1986 | 1.08 | ||||||
| 2013 | 1.05 | ||||||
| 2035 | 1.08 | ||||||
| 2046 | 1.22 | ||||||
| 2059 | 1.98 | ||||||
| 2095 | 2.01 | ||||||
46P/Wirtanen is a small Jupiter-family comet with a current orbital period of 5.4 years. It was the original target for close investigation by the Rosetta spacecraft, planned by the European Space Agency, but an inability to meet the launch window caused Rosetta to be sent to 67P/Churyumov–Gerasimenko instead. In December 2019, astronomers reported capturing an outburst of the comet in substantial detail by the TESS observatory. It was last observed in 2023 and will next come to perihelion in 2029