Forum der Vereinigung der Sternfreunde

COMET C/2021 G2 (ATLAS)

M. Micheli reports detecting cometary activity in A/2021 G2 in exposures
taken by Southern Astrophysical Research Telescope (I33) on Sep. 29 UT. He
notes a 7".8 asymmetrical coma towards p.a. ~315 degs. Earlier reports noted
activity of this object when it was on the comet confirmation website:

OC Date Reporter Coma Tail PA Exposures

X02 2021-04-21 E. Bryssinck 7" 12x120s
L81 2021-05-11 A. Aletti 6"



Orbital elements:

C/2021 G2 (ATLAS)
Epoch 2021 July 5.0 TT = JDT 2459400.5
T 2024 Sept. 10.00370 TT Rudenko
q 4.9761039 (2000.0) P Q
z +0.0002428 Peri. 343.38128 -0.84635184 +0.20257823
+/-0.0000171 Node 221.14374 -0.36227105 -0.89691466
e 0.9987920 Incl. 48.47637 -0.39044623 +0.39307271
From 91 observations 2020 Nov. 3-2021 Sept. 29, mean residual 0".5.

COMET C/2021 G2 (ATLAS)
Further to CBET 4988, the reports of cometary activity listed therein
have been confirmed. C. Holt, University of Maryland, writes that 120-s CCD
exposures taken on Sept. 29 using the Goodman spectrograph's blue camera on
the 4.1-m SOAR telescope at Cerro Pachon in Chile (using AEON queued mode) in
1".5 seeing, and measured by M. Micheli, show a condensed coma of size 7".8,
being slightly asymmetric toward p.a. about 315 degrees; the total magnitude
was measured to be 19.2 using an aperture of size 5" in the g-band.