New Views From Space Show Comet Leonard Zooming Toward the Sun

Watching the video, you can see the Milky Way in the background, while Venus and Mercury perform some timely photobombing in the top right corner (Venus is the brighter of the two objects). Solar Orbiter continued to monitor Leonard until December 22, after which time it disappeared from SoloHI’s field of view.

And now we wait to see if Comet Leonard gets any brighter or if it fails to survive its journey around the Sun. It’s not the most exciting rock to ever visit the inner solar system, but we can’t expect every comet to put on a dazzling light show. Here’s to hoping we get something more dramatic in the coming year.

More: The most exciting things happening in space in 2022.