Solid bodies have intrinsic strength due to their molecular bonds. Aluminum wire may have a tensile strength of 2.4 x 10^9 dynes/cm^2 (5 million lb./ft.^2) and good steel wire a tensile strength 10 times larger still, which far exceeds the tidal force of anything short of a black hole. As stated in Section 1, comets have very low tensile strength, near 1 10^3 dynes/cm^2 (2 lb./ft.^2). They can be pulled apart very easily by tidal force (or any other substantial force, for that matter). Some 25 comets have been observed to split over the past two centuries. In other cases two or more comets have been discovered in nearly the same orbit, and calculations have indicated that they were once a single comet. A few of these cases have been obviously attributable to the tidal forces of Jupiter (Comet Brooks 2 and Comet Shoemaker-Levy 9) or the Sun (the Kreutz comet family), while other splittings have to be attributed to less obvious causes. For example, the loss of material from an active comet, which tends to occur from a few localized areas, is bound to weaken it. It may be that a rapidly rotating comet can be weakened to the point where the centrifugal force is sufficient to cause large pieces to break off.
The Kreutz family is the name given to many comets which closely approach the Sun from one direction in space. They always approach the Sun to within 3 million km or less, and some have actually hit the Sun. The family was named for Heinrich Kreutz who published extensive monographs on three of these comets and supported the idea that they had a common origin, perhaps in a giant comet observed in 372 B.C. Today the Kreutz family has eight definite, well-studied members; 16 probable members (that are listed as probable only because they didn't survive passage within 800,000 km of the Sun to permit further study); and three more possible members. Extensive work by Brian Marsden suggests that all of these may have resulted from the splitting of two comets around 1100 A.D., which in turn may have been the parts of the great comet of 372 B.C. Those Kreutz fragments which survive their encounters with the Sun are often found to have split yet again!
The classic Roche limit for a (fluid) body of density 1 g/cm^3 approaching Jupiter is about 119,000 km above the cloud tops of the planet. It is about 169,000 km for a body having a density of 0.5 g/cm^3. More complete modern theories making different assumptions result in a somewhat smaller limit. In 1886 Comet Brooks 2 came within 72,000 km of Jupiter's clouds and split into two pieces. In July 1992 Comet Shoemaker-Levy 9 came within about 25,000 km of Jupiter's clouds and fragmented into 21 or more large pieces and an enormous amount of smaller debris down to micron or submicron size. Details of this last event follow.