How to see ATLAS comet next week as it goes headless for Halloween

A headless comet might be visible from our planet in the lead-up to the spookiest night of the year.

The comet, named Comet ATLAS (C/2024 S1), is currently approaching the sun, and is due to pass closest to our star on October 28.

As it gets closer and closer to the sun, the comet is getting brighter and brighter, and may even be visible to the naked eye in the coming days. Some estimates predict that the comet will be brighter than Venus in our skies by Halloween.

However, Comet ATLAS (C/2024 S1) appears to be breaking apart, and may soon be all tail and no head.

Nicknamed the Halloween comet due to the timing of its close approach, Comet ATLAS (C/2024 S1) is a newly-discovered comet spotted for the first time on September 27 this year.

What is a comet?

“Comets are small celestial bodies, usually made up of rock and ice, which are normally stable in areas far from the sun (for instance in the Kuiper and Oort clouds). Sometimes, something disturbs these clouds and one or more comets enter the vicinity of the sun. There, the materials that compose them volatilize and they develop the famous tails that sometimes make them visible from Earth,” María José Martínez Usó, a professor and comet researcher at the Universitat Politècnica de València in Spain, told Newsweek.

Halloween comet

This comet is thought to be a Kreutz sungrazer, a family of comets which pass incredibly close to the sun, and may all have originated from the same large comet that broke up when it came too close to the sun, according to NASA.

Comet ATLAS (C/2024 S1) is thought to be breaking apart as it gets closer, due to its brightness being spotted fluctuating by around 2 magnitudes.

“The comet has almost certainly disintegrated,” Qicheng Zhang of the Lowell Observatory told spaceweather.com. “There’s probably not much left of its primary core.”

If the comet does break apart during its close encounter with the sun, then the remaining fragments could form a bright tail without the comet’s head itself being present in the days afterward. If it somehow stays intact, then the comet will appear much brighter in our skies in the coming days.

How to see the ATLAS comet

The comet is due to pass closest to the sun (perihelion) on October 28, and passes closest to the Earth on October 24, but may also be visible in the days after its skirmish with the sun. The days before perihelion will be best for spotting the comet from the Southern Hemisphere, but the days afterward will be best from the Northern Hemisphere.

NASA estimates that the comet may be visible low in the eastern sky just before and after sunrise.

“For the Washington, D.C. area (and similar latitudes) this comet will be above the horizon before morning twilight begins from now to October 21 as the comet falls toward the Sun. If it doesn’t break into pieces too small to see around closest approach, it should also be visible (with binoculars or a telescope) from November 2 to December 19 as the comet speeds away from the Sun,” NASA astronomer Gordon Johnston wrote in a NASA blog post.

NASA predicts that it may be brighter than magnitude -5 between around 7 and 8 a.m. EDT. A brighter object has a smaller positive magnitude or larger negative magnitude, with the full moon having a magnitude of -13, while Venus having a magnitude of -5. Comets usually aren’t visible to the naked eye until they hit a magnitude of about +3.

“From the East Coast of North America the comet at its brightest will be to the lower left of the Sun just after sunrise, which means we will be viewing it through more air, increasing the chance of interference from scattered sunlight and clouds,” Johnston said.

“To look for this comet during the short period when it is very close to the Sun, find out for your location which side of the Sun the comet will be on, then find something to block the Sun (e.g., a house or building, etc., the farther away the better) so you can look for the comet without staring at the Sun.”

Johnston strongly urges comet-gazing hopefuls to not use binoculars or telescopes during this period, as looking at the sun using these instruments could damage your eyes.

If the comet does break apart, however, its headless tail may not be visible to the naked eye.

Do you have a tip on a science story that Newsweek should be covering? Do you have a question about comets? Let us know via science@newsweek.com.