by John Sarkissian (CASS)

This beautiful picture of Comet Lovejoy was taken by CSIRO’s Parkes staff member John Sarkissian when it was visible above the illuminated 64-m Parkes Telescope on the 28th of December 2011. The comet, official known as C/2011 W3 (Lovejoy) was discovered on the 27th of November 2011 by Australian amateur astronomer Terry Lovejoy . His new find, C/2014 Q2 , discovered on the 17th of August 2014, is currently visible in the sky . Comet Lovejoy’s complex ion tail recently featured on APOD .