C/2010 X1

C/2010 X1 ( Elenin ) was a long -period comet, which was discovered on 10 December 2010 by Russian amateur astronomer Leonid Elenin. Leonid Elenin found the comet on four images of a remote-controlled telescope of the ISON -NM Observatory, Mayhill, New Mexico. For his discovery of the comet had an apparent magnitude 19.5 to 19.6 mag.

In its approach to the Sun Elenin started breaking up in August 2011. C/2010 X1 passed perihelion ( the closest to the Sun point of its path ) September 10, 2011 at a distance of 0.48 AU. As a result, its brightness decreased more and more, so that he also with larger telescopes from Earth could no longer be observed from mid-October. A few days later, a cloud of dust from the debris was observed instead of the Komets. On October 16, 2011, the remains of the comet reached 0.23 AE and the closest approach to the Earth.