[AZ-Observing] Comet Holmes/1499 Encounter
- From: Chris Schur <comets133@xxxxxxxxx>
- To: Az-Observing List <az-observing@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>, Steve Coe <stevecoe@xxxxxxxxx>, Stuart Heggie <stuart.j.heggie@xxxxxxxxxxxx>, John O'Farrell <jofarrell@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>, Peter Wehinger <pwehinger@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Fri, 7 Mar 2008 07:22:15 -0800 (PST)
HI all,
Last night and perhaps tonight is closest approach of
the still huge comet Holmes, and the Californian
nebula. My visual observation from last night showed
the comet, and the Californian nebula are both naked
eye objects, situated between epsilon and Xi persi,
and were comparable in brightness. Normally, the
California nebula is seen visually as a dim patch of
light about 1/3 the way from xi to epsilon. But last
night was really peculiar, the entire gap between the
two stars was filled in with nebulosity, with the
comet filling in the dark gap between the nebula and
epsilon.
In the binoculars, the view improved, and not only
could you easily see the elongated orientation of the
California nebula, but the round spherical glow of the
dim 6th magnitude comet was now a separate object.
I took about an hour of images, and a quick look this
morning showed that the comet has an inner brighter
sharp edged disk in the middle, surrounded by a very
round and faint sharp edged outer glow. The
appearance is much like the Eskimo nebula. I hope to
post this in a day or so.
Hope you can get out and see this tonight, it was an
inspiring sight!
Chris
Payson
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