This month, a comet called 46P/Wirtanen is doing a dramatic fly-by, giving Earth an unusually good view of its greenish glow.
The timing of the comet’s apparition — and its seasonally appropriate coloring — have led some to dub it the “Christmas Comet.”
On Sunday, Wirtanen’s proximity to Earth placed it in the top 10 of Earth’s modern “comet close encounters,” according to the University of Maryland’s astronomy department. And few of those other close-proximity comets were bright enough to see with the naked eye, as Wirtanen is.
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