Do some comets have tails?
Comets, meaning hairy stars, are made of a mixture of water ice and planetary dust particles. When they approach the Sun the surface partially evaporates and form a tail known as the ‘Coma ‘ an old word for a beard. The Coma always points away from the Sun and is not like the slipstream of smoke in the wind. The Solar wind of charged particles causes the coma to preceded the comet as it falls away from the Sun. They follow extremely elliptical orbits and are thought to emanate from the ‘Oort Cloud’ surrounding the outer solar system.
