On Monday, at 8.14 am, comet 252P/LINEAR will pass within 3.3 million miles of earth. With the upcoming encounter, the comet will become the fifth-closest comet to pass by our earth. Then at 10.30 am Tuesday, comet P/2016 BA14 will pass within 2.1 million miles, the third-closest comet since 1770.
Michael S. P. Kelley of the University of Maryland said that there are chances that he could be wrong, but he thinks that they both are linked. Kelley affirmed that he has booked the Hubble Space Telescope for nine hours, so he could observe 252P when it passes by earth.
As per astronomers, the close pass by is considered to be 'rare and unusual'. It supports the idea that they both have separated at some point. In 2000, 252P was discovered by MIT astronomers and BA14 was first spotted from the Hawaiian observatory Pan-STARRS.
Paul Chodas, manager at NASA's Center for Near-Earth Objects, was of the view, "We know comets are relatively fragile things. ... During a previous pass through the inner-solar system, or during a distant fly-by of Jupiter, a chunk that we now know of as BA14 might have broken off of 252P".
Chodas further added that the comets do not pose threat to earth. In fact, the fly-bys are considered as an excellent opportunity for scientific advancement on the study of comets.
Gareth V. Williams, associate director of the International Astronomical Union's Minor Planet Center in Cambridge, said that scientists need to know about comet BA14's orbit before astronomers can concluded both are related to each other.
A report published in the TechTimes News said, "The pair of comets due to pass by Earth are traveling along nearly-identical orbits in their paths around the sun. This discovery, revealed through observations taken at the Discovery Channel Telescope (DCT), suggests the two bodies may have once been parts of a larger object that broke apart."
"We know comets are relatively fragile things, as in 1993 when comet Shoemaker-Levy 9 was discovered and its pieces linked to a flyby of Jupiter. Perhaps during a previous pass through the inner-solar system, or during a distant flyby of Jupiter, a chunk that we now know of as BA14 might have broken off of 252P," said Paul Chodas of Jet Propulsion Laboratory.
"Comet P/2016 BA14 was discovered on Jan. 22, 2016, by the University of Hawaii's PanSTARRS telescope on Haleakala, on the island of Maui. It was initially thought to be an asteroid, but follow-up observations by a University of Maryland and Lowell Observatory team with the Discovery Channel Telescope showed a faint tail, revealing that the discovery was, in fact, a comet. The orbit of this newly discovered comet, however, held yet another surprise. Comet P/2016 BA14 follows an unusually similar orbit to that of comet 252P/LINEAR, which was discovered by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology's Lincoln Near Earth Asteroid Research (LINEAR) survey on April 7, 2000," according to a news report published by Phys.
"Comet P/2016 BA14 is possibly a fragment of 252P/LINEAR. The two could be related because their orbits are so remarkably similar," said Paul Chodas, manager of NASA's Center of NEO Studies (CNEOS) at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California. "We know comets are relatively fragile things, as in 1993 when comet Shoemaker-Levy 9 was discovered and its pieces linked to a flyby of Jupiter. Perhaps during a previous pass through the inner-solar system, or during a distant flyby of Jupiter, a chunk that we now know of as BA14 might have broken off of 252P."
In a report published by the DailyMail, "Researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology's Lincoln Near Earth Asteroid Research (LINEAR) discovered the 750-foot-large object on April 7, 2000. They say it will pass Earth at roughly 3.3 million miles away. Another comet was discovered just a few months ago, spotted by researchers at the University of Hawaii's PanSTARRS telecope on Haleakala, on the island of Maui, on January 22, 2016."