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#11
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Looks like Comet McNOT for me :(
Many managed to see it from Griffith Observatory, where the altitude
helped to keep it above the horizon. My first daylight comet, albeit through binoculars. I was surprised that even the tail was visible at 130pm through binocs ! Then the sun set, and it was unaided eye time, in strong twilight and haze too ! In binoculars the main part appeared to be a disk, not stellar, and the tail was a couple of degrees long ! Glad I got a chance to see it, and even image it, albeit wide angle since I didn't bring my scope. --- Dave AustinMN wrote: Clouds in the east in the AM, clouds in the west in the PM...My wife says she thought she might have seen it yesterday (I was still trapped between the skyscrapers in Minneapolis), but she did not have binoculars. Coments come and comets go. Between the cloud forecast and other comittments, looks like this one is gone for me. Austin |
#12
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Looks like Comet McNOT for me :(
On 2007-01-12, Stan Jensen wrote:
[...] As far as I know it's gone for those people north. I'm at 43N and can't see it anymore, at least according to Starry Night. And I never did get to see it. Stupid clouds here in Michigan. I've seen dozens of faint, fuzzball comets, but the brightest one in the past 30 years? Nope! I only got one glimpse of it during clear skies on Wednesday evening -- unfortunately without binoculars. And it's been cloudy since then. And I'm at 40 north, so it won't show up in my dawn/dusk sky after it passes the sun. However with all the comments from people seeing it in the daytime sky, I have some small hope of catching it in daylight yet if it clears up in the next day or two. Since it'll be below and to the left of the sun at midday, maybe I can occult the sun with a fat tree limb or something. |
#13
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Looks like Comet McNOT for me :(
It's currently pretty easy naked-eye in broad daylight, so unless the
clouds never part everyone should be able to see it, regardless of latitude. Use a building or some other object to block the sun and then look just to the east of it. You should see a small bright spot, like Venus, but slightly fuzzy. Make sure, of course, that the sun is completely blocked to avoid damaging your eyesight. If trying in twilight, start looking the moment the sun is completely below the horizon. Greg -- Greg Crinklaw Astronomical Software Developer Cloudcroft, New Mexico, USA (33N, 106W, 2700m) SkyTools: http://www.skyhound.com/cs.html Observing: http://www.skyhound.com/sh/skyhound.html Comets: http://www.skyhound.com/sh/comets.html To reply take out your eye |
#14
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Looks like Comet McNOT for me :(
Greg Crinklaw wrote:
It's currently pretty easy naked-eye in broad daylight, so unless the clouds never part everyone should be able to see it, regardless of latitude. Use a building or some other object to block the sun and then look just to the east of it. You should see a small bright spot, like Venus, but slightly fuzzy. Make sure, of course, that the sun is completely blocked to avoid damaging your eyesight. If trying in twilight, start looking the moment the sun is completely below the horizon. Thanks for reminding me to look for this. I checked at about 5:10 local time (Santa Monica, CA), when it was about 3 degrees above the horizon. (There are some trees in the way.) I followed it until it sank below the trees, so as to take maximum advantage of the (slowly) darkening twilight. At the end, I could see about one degree of tail in my 10x50s. (I would have used the C5+, but I had to climb onto the roof just to see the darned thing.) The coma was of decent size (perhaps several arcminutes) and the tail swept out a wedge of maybe 60 degrees width. The tail stretched out for about 1 degree that I could see, though it was clear that I would have been able to see quite a bit more if the sky were a little darker. The tail also curved slightly clockwise, moving away from the coma. Nice sight--very impressive in the medium twilight. -- Brian Tung The Astronomy Corner at http://astro.isi.edu/ Unofficial C5+ Home Page at http://astro.isi.edu/c5plus/ The PleiadAtlas Home Page at http://astro.isi.edu/pleiadatlas/ My Own Personal FAQ (SAA) at http://astro.isi.edu/reference/faq.html |
#15
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Looks like Comet McNOT for me :(
I (Brian Tung) wrote:
Nice sight--very impressive in the medium twilight. I forgot to mention that once I caught it in the binoculars, it was an obvious sight by the unaided eye, with even a bit of the tail. -- Brian Tung The Astronomy Corner at http://astro.isi.edu/ Unofficial C5+ Home Page at http://astro.isi.edu/c5plus/ The PleiadAtlas Home Page at http://astro.isi.edu/pleiadatlas/ My Own Personal FAQ (SAA) at http://astro.isi.edu/reference/faq.html |
#16
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Looks like Comet McNOT for me :(
wrote in message
ups.com... John Banister wrote: So what's the furtherest south anyone has seen it? I couldn't find it at 33N, but weather only allowed me to try on Wed. Barbara Wilson saw it at latitude 29.3N south of Houston. And the geometry now at all mid-northern latitudes isn't much worse than it was there then. Don't give up yet! - Tony Flanders It's been cloudy here northwest of Phoenix (33.6 North), but it FINALLY cleared late this afternoon, and I picked it up right away with binoculars, once the sun had set behind the White Tank Mountains... Viewed it in 8X42 and 11X80 binoculars, and got a few images with my digital camera, too... I had all but given up seeing it because of persistent cloudiness at all the wrong times, but got lucky tonight... -- Jan Owen To reach me directly, remove the Z, if one appears in my e-mail address... Latitude: 33.6 Longitude: -112.3 http://community.webshots.com/user/janowen21 |
#17
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Looks like Comet McNOT for me :(
Jan Owen wrote:
wrote in message ups.com... John Banister wrote: So what's the furtherest south anyone has seen it? I couldn't find it at 33N, but weather only allowed me to try on Wed. Barbara Wilson saw it at latitude 29.3N south of Houston. And the geometry now at all mid-northern latitudes isn't much worse than it was there then. Don't give up yet! - Tony Flanders It's been cloudy here northwest of Phoenix (33.6 North), but it FINALLY cleared late this afternoon, and I picked it up right away with binoculars, once the sun had set behind the White Tank Mountains... Viewed it in 8X42 and 11X80 binoculars, and got a few images with my digital camera, too... I had all but given up seeing it because of persistent cloudiness at all the wrong times, but got lucky tonight... Colorado weather opened up yesterday (more snow today :-p ). When I got to my observing site, a relatively high spot overlooking the foot hills, the sun had just slid down behind low clouds. Using 8x56 binocs, I spotted the comet fairly high above the clouds at 4:41 MST. Spotted it visually two minutes later. Naked eye, McNaught looked like Venus seen through a thin layer of clouds with a hint of an anti-solar tail. Two degrees + of slightly curved tail visible in binocs. I'll try to see it in sunlight as soon as the sun is visible again. Shawn |
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