About C/2010 KW7 (WISE)
C/2010 KW7 (WISE) is a rare comet. It swings within 2.57 AU of the Sun at perihelion.
A long-period comet falling in from the Oort Cloud, where it spent billions of years in the deep freeze before something nudged it loose.
Rare comet 46 EP
C/2010 KW7 (WISE)
Position computed live · sbdb
Loading sky survey…
Live ephemeris
This object moves — fetching its current position…
Score breakdown
· 5 badgesRare 50 pts → Epic
- Far-flung orbit (a > 50 AU) +14
- Darker than charcoal +10
- Retrograde orbit +8
- Has a proper name +8
- Comet +6
Total score 46
4 more points to reach Epic.
Badges
- Comet · +6
- Retrograde orbit · +8
- Has a proper name · +8
- Darker than charcoal · +10
- Far-flung orbit (a > 50 AU) · +14
Trivia
Hard to believe
- Against the traffic. It goes round the Sun backwards, against the direction every planet and almost everything else travels.
What it actually is
- Its orbit family. A long-period comet falling in from the Oort Cloud, where it spent billions of years in the deep freeze before something nudged it loose.
- Closest approach. At its nearest it comes within 2.57 AU of the Sun — inside the orbit of Jupiter.
- One lap. A single orbit around the Sun takes it about 998 years.
- How far it roams. Its orbit swings between 2.57 and 197.13 AU from the Sun.
Sense of scale
- Sense of scale. In everyday terms it is roughly 0.6× the height of Mount Everest.
Standing on it
- Sunlight there. Even at its closest the sunlight is only about 15% as strong as Earth's.
- Tail. Its tail always points away from the Sun, never trailing behind its motion — it is blown, not dragged.
Properties
- albedo
- 0.047
- aphelion au
- 197.12
- designation
- 2010 KW7
- diameter km
- 4.87
- eccentricity
- 0.9743
- full name
- C/2010 KW7 (WISE)
- inclination
- 147.06
- mean motion deg day
- 0.001
- moid au
- 1.63
- name
- C/2010 KW7 (WISE)
- named
- yes
- orbit class
- COM
- perihelion au
- 2.57
- semi major au
- 99.85
How to see it
Like any astronomical target, C/2010 KW7 (WISE) is best seen from a dark site away from city lights, and when it is above the horizon depends on your latitude and the time of year. Because it moves against the background stars, the live position panel on this page tracks where it is right now. The visibility panel above works out tonight's viewing window for your saved location.
Why C/2010 KW7 (WISE) is a rare comet
C/2010 KW7 (WISE) scores 46 points on Spacedle's rarity scale, which places it in the rare tier. Another 4 points would lift it into a rarer tier.
That score comes from 5 science badges — Comet, Retrograde orbit, Has a proper name, Darker than charcoal and Far-flung orbit (a > 50 AU) — each earned for a real, measurable property of the object. Rarity on Spacedle is never random: the more remarkable an object's astrophysics, the more badges it collects, the higher it scores, and the rarer it ranks.