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138P/Shoemaker–Levy

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Also known as Shoemaker-Levy 7, 1991 XIX, 1998 O1

138P/Shoemaker–Levy, also known as Shoemaker–Levy 7, is a faint Jupiter-family comet with a 7-year orbit around the Sun. During its 2012 perihelion, the comet brightened to about apparent magnitude 20.5.

Key facts

Comet.name
138P/Shoemaker–Levy
Comet.discovery_site
Palomar Observatory
Comet.discovery_date
13 November 1991
Comet.mpc_name
P/1991 V2P/1998 O1
Comet.designations
Shoemaker–Levy 71991 XIX, 1991d1
Comet.epoch
16 December 2008 (JD 2454816.5)
Comet.observation_arc
33.84 years
Comet.obs
126
Comet.perihelion
1.706 AU
Comet.aphelion
5.544 AU
Comet.semimajor
3.625 AU
Comet.eccentricity
0.52941
Comet.period
6.91 a
Comet.inclination
10.079°
Comet.asc_node
309.44°
Comet.arg_peri
95.558°
Comet.mean
177.91°
Comet.tjup
2.830

via Wikipedia infobox

Wikidata facts

Parent body
Sun
Orbital period
2524.398751946602
Show 14 more facts
time of discovery or invention
1991-11-13
discoverer or inventor
David H. Levy
provisional designation
138P/1991d1
absolute magnitude
16.7
orbital eccentricity
0.5294518760783127
semi-major axis of an orbit
3.628326437681936
periapsis
1.707302198226694
apoapsis
5.549350677137179
orbital inclination
10.07952060977841
longitude of ascending node
309.4417698756743
argument of periapsis
95.64910660338207
mean anomaly
5.860581634597394
time of periapsis
2453571.4043195443
Sources (2)

via Wikidata · CC0

~1 min read

Encyclopedic overview

2 sections
Contents
  • References
  • External links

138P/Shoemaker–Levy, also known as Shoemaker–Levy 7, is a faint Jupiter-family comet with a 7-year orbit around the Sun. During its 2012 perihelion, the comet brightened to about apparent magnitude 20.5.

There were 4 recovery images of 138P on 8 August 2018 by Pan-STARRS when the comet had a magnitude of about 21.5. The comet came to perihelion on 2 May 2019, and the next perihelion is 24 March 2026.

Excerpted from Wikipedia’s “138P/Shoemaker–Levy” article, available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.