Comet ISON Peak Today. Comet of Century? Maybe not.

Well the much anticipated date has arrived and the sky is unfortunately not ablaze with comet ISON. Anytime something is hyped as the comet of the century you need to be a little cautious. In reality Halley’s Comet will be much more spectacular. The reason there was so much hope was due to the fact this is the first pass by the inner solar system for the comet. It has never before been heated up and had a chance to boil off it/s surface. It could have had huge amounts of material to boil off and put on quite a show.

Comet ISON moves ever closer to the sun in this movie from the ESA/NASA Solar and Heliospheric Observatory, captured in the early hours of Nov. 27, 2013. A coronal mass ejection explodes off the sun — it is unlikely to damage ISON even if they cross paths.
Credit: ESA/NASA/SOHO

NASA reports today that the comet did brighten dramatically so all hope is not lost but they also state that the core may have broken up.

You can read more here at the Comet ISON Viewing and images page.