Comet ISON: Still Alive

As of Oct. 9, 2013, comet C/2012 S1 (ISON) is still alive. That's the verdict from a Hubble Space Telescope image taken on that day. At a distance of 280 million kilometers (175 million miles), the comet presented a fine sight to Hubble's keen eye: There has been some speculation that this comet may disintegrate as it gets near the Sun in late November. Comets are basically dirty snowballs; ice, rock, and gravel mixed together. As the comet warms, the ice turns into a gas, creating the fuzzy hea...