comets.venator.space

Venator

Early warning for newly discovered comets and unconfirmed objects.

Back to Contributors

15P

15P/Finlay

CometClass Ecatalogued
Unknown

Not currently visible. Last report 1758 days ago at mag 21.9. Historic peak was mag 12.3. Typical backyard telescopes will not show it. HST, JWST, or an 8–10 m class telescope might recover it with a good ephemeris.

Active comet in COBS

JSONCSV

Right ascension

—

J2000

Declination

—

J2000

Estimated magnitude

21.9

Professional survey · COBS consensus

Confidence

33

Class E · priority 60

Observations

301

Arc unknown

Last observation

1758d ago

Thu, 13 Jan 2022 22:33:35 GMT · COBS consensus

Perihelion

2028-02-09

0.998 au

Peak window

2021-07-06 → 2028-02-12

COBS peak mag 12.3 on 2021-07-09 · perihelion 2028-02-09. Window is those dates ±3 days — not a light-curve fit.

Historic peak

12.3

COBS / analyzed peak 2021-07-09

Catalog ingest

21m ago

Venator last wrote this row 2026-11-07 03:30:20 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

0.998 au

e

0.7160

i

6.78°

Ω

13.70°

ω

348.00°

a

—

MOID

—

H

—

H0 / n

—

NEO score

—

PHA score

—

RMS

—

Elongation

—

Reporting sources

  • COBS comet list

    ok

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

Name history

  • 15P/Finlay

    15P · 2026-09-14 18:27:54 UTC → current

Discoverers

  • Finlay

    Discoverer · parsed-name · 2026-09-14 18:27:54 UTC → current

Contributors

1–40 of 73

1 / 2

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