McNaught from Utah

Again caught the stunning C2006P1 McNaught at sunset on 00:23 UTC
1/14/2006 from 41 N and 111.8 W. Civil sunset was at 00:22 UTC, but 2
degree high mountains on the western horizon bring sunset about ten
minutes earlier. At 0:15 UTC, comet McNaught was not visible, now
being only 5 1/2 degs from the Sun. By 00:23, it first became visible
in 10x50 binos in the bright twilight sky, the nucleus being a bright
several negative magnitude object. About 1/4 degree of the tail was
visible, but most of it was washed out in the bright sunset light.
Mercury at -1.9 mags (ephemerides), in the same 2 deg FOV was not
visible; Venus at -3.9 mags (ephemerides) was not visible.

By 00:28 UTC, the nucleus of the comet had become a naked eye object,
between two and three degrees above the horizon. By 00:32 UTC, the
comet set. By 00:38 UTC, -3.9 Venus became clearly visible.

Since my last successful observing session on 1/10, the comet has moved
from north azimuth of the Sun to 2 degrees south azimuth of the Sun.
Although McNaught is in the FOV of SOHO, it remained a viable binocular
object at sunset.

Unfortunately, the comet is now south of the eclipitc and rises after
the Sun in the morning. For those of you skilled (and brave) enough
to do daytime observing, Cartes du Ciel is plotting McNaught to be
within 20 arcmins of Mercury as it rises at 111.8 West on 1/14/2006
UTC.


Although the comet will within 2 degrees of altitude of the setting Sun
at sunset tomorrow, I plan to give it a shot, weather permitting.

- Canopus56

canopus56 wrote:
snip all

P.S. - Since McNaught and Mercury are barely 5 degrees from the Sun,
the risk of permanent vision injury is substantial and such
observations should only be undertaken by expert observers. - C