[soycd]

The biggest surprise would be a comet without H2O.

[RetiredTexasVet]

“It is exciting because now we are starting to understand the upper dynamic layers of the comet and how they evolved.”

I’m sure many lives on earth will be immeasurably improved by this “exciting discovery”!

[mkmensinger]

Water Ice?

[Don W]

You called?

[Pete from Shawnee Mission]

OK, so we have a giant comet glacier plowing through space, full of ice, debris, and dust that it has gathered in its million year sojourn in the Oort cloud. As it approaches the sun, perhaps on multiple passes, the ice sublimates away leaving a surface crust of dust and aggregate. Eventually, the water underneath the crust is gone leaving a loose consolidation of material. If there is enough mass and gravity, it holds together. If it comes close enough to the sun the heat may fuse or partly fuse the material and it becomes a small planetary body. If not, it may continue around the sun like the shot from a 12 gauge, dispersing with time and distance, and become a regular meteor shower...

Nifty!

[Jack Hydrazine]

Why did it take so long to find water? Astronomers for the longest time have told the public that comets are essentially dirty snowballs just full of water!

Guess they have to re-write the text books.