On Tuesday, December 12, 2017 at 5:40:30 PM UTC-8, palsing wrote:
On Tuesday, December 12, 2017 at 3:30:34 PM UTC-8, Double-A wrote:
On Monday, December 11, 2017 at 2:16:54 PM UTC-8, palsing wrote:
On Sunday, December 10, 2017 at 11:15:04 AM UTC-8, Herbert Glazier wrote:

I saw Halley comet when I was 5 or 6 Many moons ago.

No Bert, you almost certainly did not see Halley's comet when you were 5 or 6 years old. The last appearance was in 1986, and I rather doubt that you are only about 37 years of age now. The appearance before that was in 1910, and I doubt very much that you are 113 or so years old now.

It must have been a different comet that you saw when you were 5 or 6 years old. A good project for you would be to research what comet was both in the sky and was also a bright naked-eye object when you were about that age...


It was probably the 1910 one. Bert's been lying about his true age for years!

The 1986 return was a big flop. I couldn't even see it.

The 1986 return of Halley's Comet was difficult to see from the city. I had the advantage of having a telescope with accurate setting circles and a good ephemeris for the comet, so I was able to sweep it up pretty easily. Once I knew exactly where it was, I could see it, very faintly, with the naked eye, but it would have been nearly impossible to find without knowing just where to look for it. Once I got out into the desert to my dark-sky observing location it was quite easy to see, a marvelous through the telescope. However, there have been many comets in my lifetime that have been far better to view, including Hale-Bopp, Hyakutake, and McNaught, the great comet of 2007. Even though McNaught was definitely a southern-hemisphere object, from my dark sky spot we could see *7* spikes in the tail at sunset, but not the comet itself. It was amazing! Here is a picture...

http://twanight.org/newTWAN/photos/3001025.jpg

... but from North America, the comet itself was well below the horizon at sunset and all we could see was the tail going left-to-right above the sunset. Just imagine cutting off the lower half of this photo, and that is what I saw. Very memorable. I was lucky to meet Rob McNaught a couple of years ago when I was part of a behind-the-scenes tour of the Anglo-Australian Telescope at Siding Springs in Australia, that was a treat for me.


I remember seeing at least 3 comets during my lifetime that I could see with my naked eyes. Halley's wasn't one of them.

Double-A