Carolyn Shoemaker obituary
by Michael Rowan-Robinson from Science | The Guardian on (#5Q1XY)
American astronomer, leading asteroid hunter and co-discoverer of Comet Shoemaker-Levy 9, which crashed into Jupiter
Carolyn Shoemaker was a housewife with no science degree when, aged 51, she started searching for comets and asteroids with her astrogeologist husband, Gene Shoemaker. By the time of her death at the age of 92 from a fall, she had established herself as one of the leading hunters of such bodies of her generation.
She found a total of 32 comets and, according to the IAU Minor Planet Center, 377 asteroids, of which 160 were her sole discoveries. Among the comets was one of the most famous of all time, Comet Shoemaker-Levy 9, which crashed into Jupiter in a spectacular display in 1994.
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