[lit-ideas] The comet Machholz
- From: "Andreas Ramos" <andreas@xxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: "Lit-Ideas" <lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Sat, 1 Jan 2005 11:50:06 -0800
There's a comet in the evening sky. It can be seen with binoculars. If you live
where the
skies are very dark, you may be able to see it without binoculars.
How to find it:
Look up towards the Southwest. You'll see Orion. To the left of Orion, there is
a very
bright blue star: that is Sirius, the Dog Star.
If you start at Sirius and continue through the three stars in Orion's belt,
you'll come to
another bright star on the right of Orion, at about the same distance as
Sirius. This is
Aldebaran, which is part of the constellation Taurus, the Bull. It's a reddish
star.
Continue in the same line from Aldebaran and you'll see the Pleiades. This is a
cluster of
stars. In Japanese, it's called Subaru. The car maker uses the star cluster as
their logo.
Look between Aldebaran and the Pleiades, slightly lower. You'll see the comet
Machholz. It's
a fuzzy ball. It's about 32 million miles away.
The comet is moving towards the Pleaides and by this coming weekend, the 8th of
January, it
will pass just below the Pleaides.
Star chart at http://encke.jpl.nasa.gov/images/04Q2/q2-3.gif
Don Machholz's account of discovering the comet
http://ephemeris.sjaa.net/0410/b.html
Photos of the comet at http://encke.jpl.nasa.gov/ and
http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap041213.html
yrs,
andreas
www.andreas.com
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