If ISON is gone, why is NASA still following it?

This is just an honest question. According to NASA, ISON is dead.

www.universityherald.com...
"If a small piece Comet ISON survived its Thanksgiving close encounter with the sun, it certainly is not still alive, NASA has announced".

But then why are they still tracking it?
iswa.gsfc.nasa.gov...:44:00&window=-1&cygnetId=261

UnBreakable
This is just an honest question. According to NASA, ISON is dead.

www.universityherald.com...
"If a small piece Comet ISON survived its Thanksgiving close encounter with the sun, it certainly is not still alive, NASA has announced".

But then why are they still tracking it?
iswa.gsfc.nasa.gov...:44:00&window=-1&cygnetId=261

Analyzing the debris to see what the Interior of the Comet was made of. I am sure there is more to it than just that as well like how Comets dissipate and how gravity affects them, possibly charting the debris field.

Oh and watching how the now aerosolized weapon will deploy its deadly Comet Red dust Zombie Virus?

reply to post by abeverage


Ok, thanks, I was under the impression there wasn't even debris left. I had presumed the encounter with the Sun left nothing behind.

"At this point it seems like there is nothing left,’ Mr Battams said at the American Geophysical Union conference in San Francisco. ‘Sorry, everyone, Comet ISON is dead. But its memory will live on".
www.dailymail.co.uk...

UnBreakable
reply to post by abeverage

 

Ok, thanks, I was under the impression there wasn't even debris left. I had presumed the encounter with the Sun left nothing behind.

"At this point it seems like there is nothing left,’ Mr Battams said at the American Geophysical Union conference in San Francisco. ‘Sorry, everyone, Comet ISON is dead. But its memory will live on".
www.dailymail.co.uk...

The Comet is no longer a "Comet" but of course there is a debris field, it was not completely vaporized nor did it hit the sun. Annual meteor showers are Comet paths and from previous breakups.

reply to post by UnBreakable



Good point have you seen this thread? www.abovetopsecret.com...

NASA knew about this comet back in 2005 anyway. There is no way they could have had deep impact in prime location for perihelion.

UnBreakable
But then why are they still tracking it?
iswa.gsfc.nasa.gov...:44:00&window=-1&cygnetId=261

If you refer to that animation, it's just the continuation of ISON's trajectory, which has been calculated long time ago. Even after a comet disintegrates, you can still point to the place where it would've been now, or in the future.

As for the real tracking, detecting and studying ISON's debris allows astronomers to learn more about what it was made of, and how it broke up. It's like crime investigators looking at the crime scene and the dead body to learn what and how it happened.

truthserum777
reply to post by UnBreakable

 

Good point have you seen this thread? www.abovetopsecret.com...

NASA knew about this comet back in 2005 anyway. There is no way they could have had deep impact in prime location for perihelion.

There's no way NASA or anybody else could know about this comet in 2005; it was too far away and beyond the capability of any telescope we have.

Deep Impact was approximately 150 million km from ISON, hardly a prime location. neo.jpl.nasa.gov...

truthserum777
reply to post by UnBreakable

 

Good point have you seen this thread? www.abovetopsecret.com...

NASA knew about this comet back in 2005 anyway. There is no way they could have had deep impact in prime location for perihelion.

edit on 13-12-2013 by truthserum777 because: (no reason given)

Deep impact was not in "prime location" at perihelion.

No, they didn't know about it in 2005. Furthermore, comets that have long since been dead are still listed on NASA sites. Just because they're dead doesn't mean the data gets deleted. For instance, an ATS favorite:
ssd.jpl.nasa.gov...

reply to post by ngchunter


Nice toy he's playing with but even at the time of this guys video Deep Impact was back online and was traveling to the far side of the sun if not already positioned in orbit to capture an image of ISON's core.

It was NEVER, wildly spinning out of control as your guy in the video says.

lunaticoutpost.com...

Note: I have not scoured the internet for credible sources to back up my statements so please take them as you may.

truthserum777
reply to post by ngchunter

 

Nice toy he's playing with but even at the time of this guys video Deep Impact was back online and was traveling to the far side of the sun if not already positioned in orbit to capture an image of ISON's core.

No, Deep Impact was not back online (Dahboo7 is anything but credible as a source; the existence of Java applets that still have Deep Impact in them means nothing; they're simply two body simulations same as Celestia, they will happily "predict" Deep Impact's location, they don't stop working just because the probe stopped working) and there was nothing special about its position relative to ISON. STEREO Behind was "closer" to being "aligned" than Deep Impact, and STEREO Ahead had a superior point of view than either of those two because it could see ISON the whole time without it being obstructed by the occulting disc (which Deep Impact didn't even have).