A newly discovered comet was spotted flying 2.7 million miles from the sun during last week's solar eclipse before disintegrating into dust particles from the intense radiation. Named C/2020 X3 (SOHO), the comet was discovered by an amateur astronomer who sifted through satellite data the day before the total solar eclipse on December 14. C/2020 X3 appears as a tiny speck flying through the sky, but experts say it was traveling roughly 450,000 miles per hour as it whizzed past Earth's giant star. On December 14, the comet was a tiny bright dot in images of the solar eclipse. The total solar eclipse swept over South America last week, plunging thousands in Argentina and Chile into darkness for about two minutes.

Source: Daily Mail December 22, 2020 19:07 UTC