[X] My Assistant

[Stu]

This has been in the news for a week or so now, with many "experts" predicting it might become very bright around Jan 8-10th in the evening sky as seen from the n hemisphere.

And, after several nights of wasting my time and freezing my fingers off, I'm happy to be able to report my first sighting of Comet McNaught!! Frustrated by great black pillows of cloud in the comet's direction last night, but a very clear WSW horizon tonight lured me back up the sloppy-mud covered track that leads up to Kendal Castle, and from there, at 16.49, I got my first glimpse of the comet. Phew!!

It wasn't visible to the naked eye - well, not my naked eye, anyway - but it is very, very easy to see in binoculars, its head a star-like point and an obvious (and very straight, I thought...) tail stabbing away from it at almost a 45degree angle. The head looked orange-yellowish in my 10x50s, and there seemed, when using averted vision, to be quite a fan-shaped tail sweeping to the upper right. Unfortunately I didn't get to see the comet in a darker sky because it started playing hide and seek behind several horizontal bands of cloud, but my last sighting of it this evening, at 17.05, was very nice... orange-grey sky, streaked with lines of cloud, and Comet McNaught glinting above them like a spark.

Here's hoping others had some luck tonight too!

[NMRguy]

Having moved to Amsterdam last year, I kind of wrote off time-sensitive planetary observations. Cloud cover always coincides with comets and meteor showers. This winter has been characteristically dreary, and today was exceptionally bad. Rain, clouds, and wind advisories! Baah.

Extraordinarily enough, the clouds vanished right before sunset. I couldn’t believe my luck! So at 5:30pm, I climbed up to the 14th floor and looked southwest. I found Venus, and sure enough off to the right and not quite half way down was a beautiful fuzzy star. The red glow of the sunset was still prominent near the horizon, correspondingly reducing the apparent brightness of the comet. That I could see anything at all is a testament to the remarkable strength of the comet output.

Overall, the tail was very visible and appeared to be at least two full moon diameters. I am sure that additional darkening would have improved viewing further. But just as quickly as the clouds had disappeared, they returned and consumed Comet McNaught. I count myself among the lucky.

Although McNaught is a very bright comet, I would hesitate from calling it a “Great Comet”. Its orbit precludes it from being widely visible to the public—at least in the Northern Hemisphere. The main show on this side of the sun has always been low in the sky near the horizon. Those of you in the Southern Hemisphere should keep your fingers crossed for a brighter return. And although I do have fonder memories of Hale-Bopp and especially Hyakutake, I would rate this as a very pleasing comet viewing experience.

[Toma B]

...Those of you in the Southern Hemisphere should keep your fingers crossed for a brighter return...

Hmmmm.....
Lets see...does anybody here live in southern hemisphere...
James Canvin Sidney / Australia
Tesheiner ??? / Brazil

Good luck to you guys!
Enjoy!

[jamescanvin]

B)-->

Hmmmm.....
Lets see...does anybody here live in southern hemisphere...
James Canvin Sidney / Australia
[/quote]

Yup, I've already been scoping out some potential viewing sites. It's still going to be very close to the setting sun for us down here. My problem is I live right in the far east of Sydney (on the coast) so the comet is going to be inland over all the light of Sydney, not to mention that Sydney is quite hilly and getting a good view of the horizon is difficult. I'm still unsure if I have any morning opportunities to see it (not while it's at it's brightest I think, and it is always going to be closer to the horizon than in the evening) as then I am looking out to sea which is of course much better! I just hope the weather plays ball, although it's been cloudless the last few days it's been hot and humid which has made the atmosphere very hazy and each evening I've been looking at the bright white western sky as the sun sets and thinking I'd have no hope if it stays as is.

James

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