C/2019 O3 Palomar
more info
Comet C/2019 O3 was discovered on 26 July 2019, more than 1.5 yr before its perihelion passage. Later a series of pre-discovery observations were found going back to 14 May 2019. This comet was observed until 24 October 2024 (as in February 2025).

Comet had its closest approach to the Earth on 23 July 2020 (8.27 au); 7.5 months before its perihelion passage.

Currently, preferred NG solution given here are based on data span over 5.39 yr in a range of heliocentric distances: 9.61 au – 8.82 au (perihelion) – 11.51 au. Orbits based on pre-perihelion and post-perihelion data independently were also obtained.

This Oort spike comet suffers small planetary perturbations during its passage through the planetary system that lead to a more tight future orbit with semimajor axis of about 7,200 au (see future barycentric orbits).
solution description
number of observations 2307
data interval 2019 05 14 – 2024 10 05
data type perihelion within the observation arc (FULL)
data arc selection entire data set (STD)
range of heliocentric distances 9.61 au – 8.82 au (perihelion) – 11.51 au
detectability of NG effects in the comet's motion comet with determinable NG~orbit
type of model of motion GR - gravitational orbit
data weighting YES
number of residuals 4565
RMS [arcseconds] 0.42
orbit quality class 1a+
orbital elements (barycentric ecliptic J2000)
Epoch 2334 08 14
perihelion date 2021 03 05.74608432 ± 0.00072125
perihelion distance [au] 8.81538597 ± 0.00000343
eccentricity 0.99873195 ± 0.00000247
argument of perihelion [°] 59.971859 ± 0.000037
ascending node [°] 300.437589 ± 0.000007
inclination [°] 89.860603 ± 0.000003
reciprocal semi-major axis [10-6 au-1] 143.84 ± 0.28
file containing 5001 VCs swarm
2019o3bb.bpl
Upper panel: Time distribution of positional observations with corresponding heliocentric (red curve) and geocentric (green curve) distance at which they were taken. The horizontal dotted line shows the perihelion distance for a given comet whereas vertical dotted line — the moment of perihelion passage.
Middle panel(s): O-C diagram for a given solution (sometimes in comparison to another solution available in CODE), where residuals in right ascension are shown using magenta dots and in declination by blue open circles.
Lowest panel: Relative weights for a given data set(s).
Six 2D-projections of the 6D space of future swarm including 5001 VCs. Each density map is given in logarithmic scale presented on the right in the individual panel.