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> often these long period comets will be on their first pass (sometimes only pass) through the solar system.

Only pass because of the eccentricity, or for some other reason?


ddahlen
Oort cloud comets are so distant that they are only weakly gravitationally bound to the solar system. When they come in and we see them, they have enough energy to go back out to the extreme distances. Minor nudges from the big planets are enough to cause them to become ejected from the solar system (ecc>1). This can lead to the whole "one and done" thing.

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