Comet C/2006 P1 McNaught

On Fri, 19 Jan 2007 18:14:15 -0600, Pat Flannery
wrote:

Prettiest one I ever saw was Comet West, which had a distinct light blue
color to its tail.

....You'd be surprised how few people even know about West. Everyone
was burned by Kohoutek, and then the astronomers pointed out that
Halley wasn't going to be that great a view in the US, so comets
suddenly became about as thrilling as a broken pet rock or a cracked
mood ring. The problem could have been averted had West been hyped as
the "Bicentennial Comet", but nobody seemed to realize the idea at the
time.

....I saw West through my Celestron, but didn't get any pictures as my
Retina 1B was in the shop getting the shutter assembly cleaned and
recalibrated - it had gone out of whack for the first time since my
pop bought it during the Korean Peace Action - and the camera shop I
went to wasn't able to get two parts needed for seven months as the
camera was a German design and the only source of spare parts at the
time was in *East* Germany. By that time, West wasn't worth looking
at, and I'd sold my Celestron to a cousin who not only had a Canon
mount for it, he could also afford a then state-of-the-art tracking
motor for the damn thing that I couldn't.

Ah well...


OM
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OM wrote:
...I saw West through my Celestron,

YOU SON-OF-A-BITCH!
You actually _owned_ a Celestron as a kid!?
Well, I hope it was a Celestron 5", because if it was a a 8", or God
help us, a 14"...you must die.
I got to see Comet West through my 7 x 50 binoculars purchased for
$18.00 from our local Holiday gas station. :-P

Pat

"Pat Flannery" wrote in message
...


What's this one's path on the outboard leg from the Sun look like?

South and more south, I'm afraid :-)