"Mind Blowing COMETS That Surprised 2025"
Several comets astonished sky watchers and Astro photographers mid in 2025. Comet Comet C/2024 G3 (ATLAS), photographed here from Southern Hemisphere, took the crown on January 13, 2025.
Comets tend to be little known. In 2025, this worked in our favor, with three particularly notable comets garnering attention.
The year started with the comet we expected would be the best: C/2024 G3 (ATLAS), which reached perihelion — the closest point to the sun in its orbit — on January 12. On February 1, ZTF passed closest to Earth, coming within about 0.3 astronomical units of our planet. (An astronomical unit, or AU, is the average Earth-Sun distance.) During its journey, ZTF eventually reached magnitude 4.5 and developed a well-defined anti-tail.
Magnitude 4.5 is also the brightness that our next visitor, Comet C/2025 A6 (Lemmon), is expected to reach in November this year, a few weeks before perihelion.
On July 20, 2025, observer Alec Tamas went looking for the then-magnitude 16.6 comet and found that an outburst had pushed it to magnitude 11.6. By early October, the comet had faded only slightly—and a second outburst occurred on October 5, reaching nearly the same magnitude as the July one.
Both times, the comet displayed a unique "horned" or horseshoe shape, earning it the nickname "Devil Comet." According to comet researcher Richard Miles (who observed the second outburst), Pons brooks has had similar flare events during previous visits to the inner solar system. Perhaps it has had another flare event since this issue went to press!
After perihelion, C/2024 G3 (ATLAS) it disappeared from the skies of the Northern Hemisphere and could only be seen below the equator as it rapidly faded on its way back to the outer solar system. Its appearance was brief and it was never easy to see with the naked eye due to its low altitude. Still, Nishimura was the decisive winner of the comet of 2025 crown.
@ Bhautik Thummar