[NatureNS] Re: Another view of Comet McNaught

rrtwoods@yahoo.com

naturens@chebucto.ns.ca

naturens-mml-owner@chebucto.ns.ca

k --0-1079329050-1168610332=:41582 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit I also was able to get a good view and showed half a dozen others at the Grocery store parking lot in elmsdale as well. All were impressed. Hopefully we will get some more opportunities over the weekend. Picture in todays herald did not do it justice. To bad coverage of this event has been a little late in the press. Rob Woods Terri Crane <terri.crane@ns.sympatico.ca> wrote: Thanks Sherman for the aleart on the comet McNaught. We had spectacular views of it this evening, ~1704hrs - 1739hrs. WOW! With Alexanders enthusiasim (my 8yr old Son) the teacher will probable have to sit on him tomorrow to calm him down. As already noted by others i echo the tail was more impressive without aids than with either Bio's or telescope. At arms lenth it measured 4"+, I could only imagine what it would look like if it was visable in a darker part of the sky later through the night. Tom K Canso ----- Original Message ----- From: Sherman Williams To: naturens@chebucto.ns.ca Sent: Thursday, January 11, 2007 2:17 AM Subject: [NatureNS] Re: Another view of Comet McNaught January 10, 2007: Once again I had the good fortune of having yet another good view of Comet McNaught. Although I spent most of the observing time (5:11 to 5:32 p.m. ) enjoying the comet through my 10X50 binoculars, I managed a couple quick digital photos from which I'll choose and post one later on. Between 4:00 and 4:45 I had been in New Minas doing an errand; at that time the area was receiving a heavy snow flurry from heavy dark clouds all around especially to the south. Then abruptly the flurries abated and the north side of the Valley and especially westward, cloud began to lift away, allowing the setting Sun to appear. The cloud's dividing line literally was the solar disk. East and south of it was solid cloud, west of it was a narrow strip of open, clear sky, running around to the North Mountain. Some cloud remained overhead. Noting the time and the nice clear strip in the west, my next move was clear; I headed for a location where I knew I could use the opening for a possible view of the comet (Middle Dyke Road, running north from New Minas, crossing the Valley dykelands just beyond the Gesner Momument and Chipman Corner). By 5 p.m. I had turned off into a farm road looking westward, overlooking flat dykeland. I had a great view of the open strip of sky and it looked like it was perfectly positioned. Relative to the Sun's setting position, McNaught had to pass through the opening (if more cloud didn't get there first). Appear it did! Comet McNaught popped out from under the upper cloud layer at 5:11. From then, until about 5:25, the path for the next 143 million kilometres to the westward, between me and C/2006 P1, was unobstructed . What luck! What a sight! My immediate impression was that its brightness had increased over last evening's view, especially the intensity of the comet head. Its brightness was a little reminiscent of seeing Mercury under similar circumstances, except the comet seemed brighter, but that may be my mind playing subjective tricks (seeing such a bright comet in the evening twilight is much more rare than seeing Mercury). It is bright, for sure. Imagine the sight if this were in a dark sky! . At 5:17 I took my eyes away from the binoculars and noted that the comet and some of its tail was easily visible naked-eye. Reluctant to take my eyes away from the binoculars, I would break away to hastily take a few shots with the camera I had set up on the tripod. All too quickly, about 5:25, the comet began to drop into the wispy fringe of lower cloud. At 5:32 McNaught's light become indistinguishable from the billows of cloud that moved up around it. P.S. This morning there was a reasonable clear opening above the eastern horizon, every bit as opportunistic as this evening. From a location near Windsor, I began a careful search from about 7:20 a.m. until sunrise, without success. Catching the comet in the morning is a greater challenge. Sherman Sherman Williams sherm@glinx.com website: http://www.glinx.com/~sherm On 10-Jan-07, at 8:49 PM, Roy Bishop wrote: The clouds parted low in the WSW sky over Avonport late this afternoon (January 10) revealing Comet McNaught in the evening twilight for a third time (previously on January 7 and 9). I watched the comet from when it dropped into view at 17:23 until 17:33 when it vanished behind a cloud layer near the horizon. It was easily a naked-eye object, the head of the comet being even brighter than yesterday as it approaches perihelion less than two days from now, and less than half of Mercury’s distance from the Sun. The coma has changed in appearance from 24 hours ago, becoming more pointed with a blazing “nucleus” at its tip; not surprising as it is being blasted by solar radiation more than 30 times more intense than at Earth’s location. Against the twilight sky the tail is still a narrow fan with well-defined edges. I looked for structure within the tail (15 x 45 IS binoculars), but it appeared quite uniform in brightness, other than fading gradually to blend into the twilight about 0.5-degree from the head. Twice while I was watching flocks of ducks in silhouette flew past the comet. ( I also saw several ducks fly through my binocular field in silhouette against the sky. It was a neat sight with a comet in the background. ) After Earth’s rotation raised the horizon clouds to cover the comet, I could see its head for another minute, a bright spot penetrating the dark cloud. A magnitude estimate is difficult given the atmospheric extinction at that low altitude, the lack of any nearby reference objects of known magnitude, and the bright twilight, but it must have been at least -1 if not -2. There is an orbit animation for Comet McNaught at: http://neo.jpl.nasa.gov/cgi-bin/db_shm?name=c/2006+P1 The animation shows that during the past several days the comet has been rushing almost straight at Earth as it vaults over the north pole of the Sun. Over the next few days the comet will plunge southward as it passes perihelion and starts its long journey back out away from the Sun. That journey will take essentially forever, because with an orbital eccentricity of 1.000011 and passing well clear of any planets as it recedes, the Great Comet of 2007 will be on its way to interstellar space, never to return. Roy --------------------------------- Food fight? Enjoy some healthy debate in the Yahoo! Answers Food & Drink Q&A. --0-1079329050-1168610332=:41582 Content-Type: text/html; charset=iso-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit <div>I also was able to get a good view and showed half a dozen others at the Grocery store parking lot in elmsdale as well. All were impressed. Hopefully we will get some more opportunities over the weekend. Picture in todays herald did not do it justice. To bad coverage of this event has been a little late in the press.</div> <div> </div> <div>Rob Woods<BR><BR><B><I>Terri Crane <terri.crane@ns.sympatico.ca></I></B> wrote:</div> <BLOCKQUOTE class=replbq style="PADDING-LEFT: 5px; MARGIN-LEFT: 5px; BORDER-LEFT: #1010ff 2px solid"> <META content="MSHTML 6.00.2800.1561" name=GENERATOR> <STYLE></STYLE> <DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>Thanks Sherman for the aleart on the comet McNaught. We had spectacular views of it this evening, ~1704hrs - 1739hrs. </FONT></DIV> <DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV> <DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>WOW!  </FONT></DIV> <DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV> <DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>With Alexanders enthusiasim (my 8yr old Son) the teacher will probable have to sit on him tomorrow to calm him down.</FONT></DIV> <DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV> <DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>As already noted by others i echo the tail was more impressive without aids</FONT> <FONT face=Arial size=2>than with either Bio's or telescope. At arms lenth it measured 4"+, I could only imagine what it would look like if it was visable in a darker part of the sky later through the night.</FONT></DIV> <DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV> <DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>Tom K</FONT></DIV> <DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>Canso</FONT></DIV> <DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV> <BLOCKQUOTE dir=ltr style="PADDING-RIGHT: 0px; PADDING-LEFT: 5px; MARGIN-LEFT: 5px; BORDER-LEFT: #000000 2px solid; MARGIN-RIGHT: 0px"> <DIV style="FONT: 10pt arial">----- Original Message ----- </DIV> <DIV style="BACKGROUND: #e4e4e4; FONT: 10pt arial; font-color: black"><B>From:</B> Sherman Williams

To: naturens@chebucto.ns.ca </DIV> <DIV style="FONT: 10pt arial"><B>Sent:</B> Thursday, January 11, 2007 2:17 AM</DIV> <DIV style="FONT: 10pt arial"><B>Subject:</B> [NatureNS] Re: Another view of Comet McNaught</DIV> <DIV><BR></DIV> <DIV style="MARGIN: 0px">January 10, 2007: Once again I had the good fortune of having yet another good view of Comet McNaught. Although I spent most of the observing time (5:11 to 5:32 p.m. ) enjoying the comet through my 10X50 binoculars, I managed a couple quick digital photos from which I'll choose and post one later on.   </DIV> <DIV style="MIN-HEIGHT: 14px; MARGIN: 0px; FONT: 12px Helvetica"><BR></DIV> <DIV style="MARGIN: 0px">Between 4:00 and 4:45 I had been in New Minas doing an errand; at that time the area was receiving a heavy snow flurry from heavy dark clouds all around especially to the south. Then abruptly the flurries abated and the north side of the Valley and especially westward, cloud began to lift away, allowing the setting Sun to appear. The cloud's dividing line literally was the solar disk. East and south of it was solid cloud, west of it was a narrow strip of open, clear sky, running around to the North Mountain. Some cloud remained overhead. </DIV> <DIV style="MIN-HEIGHT: 14px; MARGIN: 0px; FONT: 12px Helvetica"><BR></DIV> <DIV style="MARGIN: 0px">Noting the time and the nice clear strip in the west, my next move was clear;  I headed for a location where I knew I could use the opening for a possible view of the comet (Middle Dyke Road, running north from New Minas, crossing the Valley dykelands just beyond the Gesner Momument and Chipman Corner). By 5 p.m. I  had turned off into a farm road looking westward, overlooking flat dykeland.  I had a great view of the open strip of sky and it looked like it was perfectly positioned. Relative to the Sun's setting position, McNaught had to pass through the opening (if more cloud didn't get there first).  </DIV> <DIV style="MIN-HEIGHT: 14px; MARGIN: 0px; FONT: 12px Helvetica"><BR></DIV> <DIV style="MARGIN: 0px">Appear it did!   Comet McNaught popped out from under the upper cloud layer at 5:11.  From then, until about 5:25, the path for the next 143 million kilometres to the westward, between me and C/2006 P1, was unobstructed .  What luck! What a sight!   My immediate impression was that its brightness had increased over last evening's view, especially the intensity of the comet head. Its brightness was a little reminiscent of seeing Mercury under similar circumstances, except the comet seemed brighter, but that may be my mind playing subjective tricks (seeing such a bright comet in the evening twilight is much more rare than seeing Mercury). It is bright, for sure. Imagine the sight if this were in a dark sky! .  </DIV> <DIV style="MIN-HEIGHT: 14px; MARGIN: 0px; FONT: 12px Helvetica"><BR></DIV> <DIV style="MARGIN: 0px">At 5:17 I took my eyes away from the binoculars and noted that the comet and some of its tail was easily visible naked-eye. Reluctant to take my eyes away from the binoculars,  I  would break away to hastily take a few shots with the camera I had set up on the tripod. All too quickly, about 5:25, the comet began to drop into the wispy fringe of lower cloud. At 5:32 McNaught's light  become indistinguishable from the billows of cloud that moved up around it.</DIV> <DIV style="MIN-HEIGHT: 14px; MARGIN: 0px; FONT: 12px Helvetica"><BR></DIV> <DIV style="MARGIN: 0px">P.S. This morning there was a reasonable clear opening above the eastern horizon, every bit as opportunistic as this evening.  From a location near Windsor, I began a careful search from about 7:20 a.m. until sunrise, without success. Catching the comet in the morning is a greater challenge.</DIV> <DIV style="MIN-HEIGHT: 14px; MARGIN: 0px; FONT: 12px Helvetica"><BR></DIV> <DIV style="MARGIN: 0px">Sherman </DIV> <DIV style="MIN-HEIGHT: 14px; MARGIN: 0px; FONT: 12px Helvetica"><BR></DIV> <DIV style="MARGIN: 0px">Sherman Williams</DIV> <DIV style="MARGIN: 0px">sherm@glinx.com

website: http://www.glinx.com/~sherm</DIV> <DIV style="MIN-HEIGHT: 14px; MARGIN: 0px; FONT: 12px Helvetica"><BR></DIV> <DIV style="MIN-HEIGHT: 14px; MARGIN: 0px; FONT: 12px Helvetica"><BR></DIV> <DIV style="MARGIN: 0px">On 10-Jan-07, at 8:49 PM, Roy Bishop wrote:</DIV> <div style="MARGIN: 0px 0px 12px"><FONT class=Apple-style-span color=#0000dc>The clouds parted low in the WSW sky over Avonport late this afternoon (January 10) revealing  Comet McNaught in the evening twilight for a third time (previously on January 7 and 9).</FONT></div> <div style="MARGIN: 0px 0px 12px"><FONT class=Apple-style-span color=#0000dc>I watched the comet from when it dropped into view at 17:23 until 17:33 when it vanished behind a cloud layer near the horizon. It was easily a naked-eye object, the head of the comet being even brighter than yesterday as it approaches perihelion less than two days from now, and less than half of Mercury’s distance from the Sun.  The coma has changed in appearance from 24 hours ago, becoming more pointed with a blazing “nucleus” at its tip; not surprising as it is being blasted by solar radiation more than 30 times more intense than at Earth’s location.</FONT></div> <div style="MARGIN: 0px 0px 12px"><FONT class=Apple-style-span color=#0000dc>Against the twilight sky the tail is still a narrow fan with well-defined edges. I looked for structure within the tail (15 x 45 IS binoculars), but it appeared quite uniform in brightness, other than fading gradually to blend into the twilight about 0.5-degree from the head.</FONT></div> <div style="MARGIN: 0px 0px 12px"><FONT class=Apple-style-span color=#0000dc>Twice while I was watching flocks of ducks in silhouette flew past the comet.</FONT></div> <div style="MARGIN: 0px 0px 12px">( I also saw several ducks fly through my binocular field in silhouette against the sky. It was a neat sight with a comet in the background. )</div> <div style="MARGIN: 0px 0px 12px"><FONT class=Apple-style-span color=#0000dc>After Earth’s rotation raised the horizon clouds to cover the comet, I could see its head for another minute, a bright spot penetrating the dark cloud. A magnitude estimate is difficult given the atmospheric extinction at that low altitude, the lack of any nearby reference objects of known magnitude, and the bright twilight, but it must have been at least -1 if not -2.</FONT></div> <div style="MARGIN: 0px 0px 12px"><FONT class=Apple-style-span color=#0000dc>There is an orbit animation for Comet McNaught at:</FONT></div> <div style="MARGIN: 0px 0px 12px">http://neo.jpl.nasa.gov/cgi-bin/db_shm?name=c/2006+P1</div> <div style="MARGIN: 0px 0px 12px"><FONT class=Apple-style-span color=#0000dc>The animation shows that during the past several days the comet has been rushing almost straight at Earth as it vaults over the north pole of the Sun. Over the next few days the comet will plunge southward as it passes perihelion and starts its long journey back out away from the Sun. That journey will take essentially forever, because with an orbital eccentricity of 1.000011 and passing well clear of any planets as it recedes, the Great Comet of 2007 will be on its way to interstellar space, never to return.</FONT></div> <DIV style="MARGIN: 0px"><FONT class=Apple-style-span color=#0000dc>Roy</FONT></DIV></BLOCKQUOTE></BLOCKQUOTE><BR><p>  <hr size=1>Food fight? Enjoy some healthy debate
in the Yahoo! Answers Food & Drink Q&A. --0-1079329050-1168610332=:41582--