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“We Knew This Was Something Really, Really Special”: NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope Captures a Comet’s Destruction
NASA's Hubble Space Telescope captured comet C/2025 K1 breaking into at least four fragments over three days, revealing insights into cometary physics after perihelion heating.
- On Nov. 8–10, 2025, the Hubble Space Telescope captured Comet C/2025 K1 fragmenting in real time, showing progressive breakup across three days.
- John Noonan, co-investigator, described the observation as accidental after technical issues forced a retarget; researchers say perihelion heating likely triggered K1's breakup.
- Hubble's high-resolution images show at least four fragments, with one undergoing a secondary split, and K1 measured about 5 miles before breaking apart.
- Their paper, published Feb. 6 in Icarus, reports K1 now scattered about 250 million miles from Earth and offering rare interior sampling of primitive material.
- Comets formed about 4.6 billion years ago and act as time capsules, with Dennis Bodewits saying, "By cracking open a comet, you can see the ancient material that has not been processed," emphasizing their importance for understanding early solar system material.
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Actually, it was only a replacement goal: when Hubble had to re-dispose, a comet broke in real time before his eyes – a historical coincidence finding.
Hubble telescope accidentally captures a comet breaking apart. See pics
The discovery was entirely accidental. Researchers had originally planned to observe a different comet, but had to switch targets due to technical constraints. What followed surprised even seasoned astronomers.
·India
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Total News Sources12
Leaning Left3Leaning Right1Center3Last UpdatedBias Distribution43% Left, 43% Center
Bias Distribution
- 43% of the sources lean Left, 43% of the sources are Center
43% Center
L 43%
C 43%
14%
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