comets.venator.space

Venator

Early warning for newly discovered comets and unconfirmed objects.

Back to Catalog

260P

260P/McNaught

CometClass Ecatalogued
Northern hemisphere

Difficult — CCD / large telescope. Around mag 14.8. A large amateur CCD or a professional telescope is required.

Active comet in COBS

JSONCSV

Right ascension

05h 09m 54s

J2000

Declination

+39° 09′ 51″

J2000

Estimated magnitude

14.8

CCD / citizen telescope · COBS consensus

Confidence

33

Class E · priority 76

Observations

42

80.00 d arc

Last observation

4d ago

Sat, 12 Sep 2026 21:50:24 GMT · COBS consensus

Perihelion

2026-08-05

1.420 au

Peak window

2026-08-02 → 2026-08-08

COBS peak mag 14.7 on 2026-08-05 · perihelion 2026-08-05. Window is those dates ±3 days — not a light-curve fit.

Historic peak

14.7

COBS / analyzed peak 2026-08-05

Catalog ingest

13m ago

Venator last wrote this row 2026-09-16 22:00:04 UTC

Light curve

Brightness over time (V mag)

Gold = reported observations. Steel dashed family = ensemble (nominal / outburst / fade / disruption).

Tail length

Converted to degrees from COBS (d / arcmin / arcsec). Empty until analysis has pulled the archive.

Ensemble is a first-pass H0/n photometric model plus observed samples — not a trained ML forecast yet. The background analyzer walks the catalog one object at a time so COBS is not flooded. Disruption track rises after perihelion to stand in for solar-wind stripping.

Orbital elements

q

1.420 au

e

0.6090

i

15.00°

Ω

349.00°

ω

18.50°

a

3.620 au

MOID

—

H

—

H0 / n

12.5 / 5

NEO score

—

PHA score

—

RMS

—

Elongation

94°

Reporting sources

  • COBS comet list

    ok

    Comet Observation Database magnitudes and perihelion data for the full COBS list (active and inactive).

  • COBS orbits

    ok

    Osculating elements and photometric parameters (H0, n) for active comets.

Name history

  • 260P/McNaught

    260P · 2026-09-08 02:09:56 UTC → current

Discoverers

  • McNaught

    Discoverer · parsed-name · 2026-09-08 17:27:23 UTC → current

Contributors

Pips are observation weight on this object (log of report count). Hover for catalog-wide weight.