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NEO Earth Close Approaches

Comet Close Approaches prior to 1900

The following table shows Earth close approaches by comets prior to 1900 within approximately 40 lunar distances (LD), sorted by close approach distance.

Comet Name Designation Date Miss Dist. (au) Miss Dist. (LD) Note
Lexell D/1770 L1 1770-Jul-01.7 0.0151 5.9  
Tempel-Tuttle 55P/1366 U1 1366-Oct-26.4 0.0229 8.9  
Halley 1P/ 837 F1 837-Apr-10.5 0.0334 13.0  
Biela 3D/1805 V1 1805-Dec-09.9 0.0366 14.2  
Comet of 1743 C/1743 C1 1743-Feb-08.9 0.0390 15.2  
Comet of 1014 C/1014 C1 1014-Feb-24.9 0.0407 15.8 *
Comet of 1702 C/1702 H1 1702-Apr-20.2 0.0437 17.0  
Comet of 1132 C/1132 T1 1132-Oct-07.2 0.0447 17.4 *
Comet of 1351 C/1351 W1 1351-Nov-29.4 0.0479 18.6 *
Comet of 1345 C/1345 O1 1345-Jul-31.9 0.0485 18.9 *
Comet of 1499 C/1499 Q1 1499-Aug-17.1 0.0588 22.9 *
Comet of 1080 C/1080 P1 1080-Aug-05.7 0.0641 24.9 *
Great comet C/1760 A1 1760-Jan-08.2 0.0681 26.5  
Comet of 1472 C/1471 Y1 1472-Jan-22.9 0.0690 26.9 *
Comet of 400 C/ 400 F1 400-Mar-31.1 0.0767 29.8 *
Comet of 1556 C/1556 D1 1556-Mar-13.0 0.0835 32.5 *
Schweizer C/1853 G1 1853-Apr-29.1 0.0839 32.7  
Bouvard-Herschel C/1797 P1 1797-Aug-16.5 0.0879 34.2  
Halley 1P/ 374 E1 374-Apr-01.9 0.0884 34.4  
Halley 1P/ 607 H1 607-Apr-19.2 0.0898 34.9  
Comet of 568 C/ 568 O1 568-Sep-25.7 0.0918 35.7 *
Messier C/1763 S1 1763-Sep-23.7 0.0934 36.3  
Tempel C/1864 N1 1864-Aug-08.4 0.0964 37.5  
Schmidt C/1862 N1 1862-Jul-04.6 0.0982 38.2  
Comet of 390 C/ 390 Q1 390-Aug-18.9 0.1002 39.0 *

* The miss distance is uncertain because this comet’s orbit is relatively poorly determined.

au (astronomical unit) ~150 million kilometers (see glossary for definition)

LD (lunar distance) ~384,000 kilometers (see glossary for definition)

Note: The comet of 1491 (1491 B1) has been removed from this table since its orbit is no longer thought to be reliable. See I. Hasegawa, Publ. Astronomical Society of Japan, 2002, vol. 54, pp. 1091-1099.