Comet bursting into the sky.

[babylonlurker]

Two days ago Comet 17P/Holmes was an insignificant piece of ice barely visible in amateur telescopes under dark skies.

Yesterday all that changed . If you have a clear sky, take a look in the constellation Perseus, there you will find an extra "fuzzy star" - visible to the unaided eye. With a visual magnitude og between 2.5 and 3 it should be about as strong as the stars in the "Big Dipper", "The Plough", "The big Wagon" or whatever you may call the most well known constellation in the Northern sky. The increase in brightness is about a million times in about 24 hours - quite amazing.

Take a look at http://www.spaceweather.com for more information - and a star map to find the comet, and http://cometography.com/pcomets/017p.html for a bit of history of this comet.

Stop Press: Latest estimates are now magnitude 2 .... even brighter ... so the outburst is still in progress.

Here's hoping for a little clear sky at my place i The Netherlands ...

Good luck with comet hunting.

[frulad]

Cool, I've been looking for something kind of off beat to do with the finacee this weekend as a break from wedding planning. Driving out to a park on night to try and find this sounds like fun.

Thanks!

[Talwyn]

Thanks for that wonderful little bit of astronomical information, very interesting indeed.

I wonder what set the comet off? I mean comets normally flare when they enter into the inner solar system but this one is 1.6 light years out from earth so that's very odd but life is full of mysteries and that's what makes it intersting

[babylonlurker]

Thanks for that wonderful little bit of astronomical information, very interesting indeed.

I wonder what set the comet off? I mean comets normally flare when they enter into the inner solar system but this one is 1.6 light years out from earth so that's very odd but life is full of mysteries and that's what makes it intersting

Strictly speaking 1.6 Astronomical Units (Earth-Sun-distance) ...1.6 light years would be far away indeed. But outside Earth orbit is indeed quite far for a comet outburst.

How long the outburst will be visible is unknown , but previous outbursts have lasted for at least a few weeks. This gives me a little hope in cloudy Netherlands. The previous (big) comet (McNaught I think) I totally missed because of clouds.

The reason is not well known, but the same comet has had outbursts like this before

[Jan]

Very cool, thanks.

Jan

ETA: Moved to 'Off-Topic' forum only because the comet's not named after JMS. ;-)

[babylonlurker]

Very cool, thanks.

Jan

ETA: Moved to 'Off-Topic' forum only because the comet's not named after JMS. ;-)

Jan, hope you get to see something . Was considering wether to post i off topic , so no problems there .

[Spoo Junky]

The first and last really bright comet I saw was Hyakutake in 1996. Even though I know what comets are, it was still really eerie to see it in the sky. No wonder people throughout history thought it was some kind of an omen.

[babylonlurker]

The first and last really bright comet I saw was Hyakutake in 1996. Even though I know what comets are, it was still really eerie to see it in the sky. No wonder people throughout history thought it was some kind of an omen.

Hyakutake was the first one I saw - even in the heavily light polluted sky here, the year after (April 1997) I had Comet Hale-Bopp floating in the sky - right in front of my balcony. I missed the big one around New Year this year - beacuse of "The Great Northern European Nebula) aka clouds.

An we had a few fine clear days and nights just before Holmes appeared, but - as my luck goes - - clouds *again*

[I love Lyta]

To quote Ben Kenobi:"That's no comet. It's a space station..."

Damn! It's overcast here with hardly a chance of change throughout the next couple of days.
To say it with 3PO: "How typical..."

[Spoo Junky]

I seem to have cloud issues for most meteor showers, it just seems to work that way. I always remember the Perseid meteor showers since my husband's birthday is at the same time, but every year - clouds! Still, I have seen a few just by accident at other times.

I also like looking up and watching for satellites - very tiny but you can see them move slowly across the sky. I've seen the space shuttle and ISS a few times too.

[babylonlurker]

As my luck goes, still cloudy here.

Spoo Junkie : My biggest miss was the Leonid fireball storm in (I think) 1998 , when the fireball storm came one night earlier than predicted. What is *really* crazy is , that the sky *was clear* that night, but I was asleep - really : AARRRGGHH !!! . Next night : nothing . A few colleagues of mine told about fireballs casting light on neighbouring buildings etc.
Next year : clouds (of course) but one year I caught the strong meteor reflections on the radio (Still Leonids)

C'est la vie ....

[Talwyn]

My bad mixing up Au with light years

Down here in the southern hemisphere I have yet to spot this comet.

My own pet whackey theory on this phenomena is that someone on the mothership that has been quietly cruising around the solar system watching us here on the 3rd rock from the sun accidently turned on the "stardrive" and now the alien captain is berrating the helmsman, "YOU FOOL! They can see us now!"

[Spoo Junky]

My own pet whackey theory on this phenomena is that someone on the mothership that has been quietly cruising around the solar system watching us here on the 3rd rock from the sun accidently turned on the "stardrive" and now the alien captain is berrating the helmsman, "YOU FOOL! They can see us now!"

That's what happened with the Vulcans

[babylonlurker]

After what feels like an eternity of cloudy weather I got to see comet Holmes.

A bit of clear sky appeared , and the comet was just visible to the unaided eye here (the sky is heavily light polluted where I live).

Without any optical instruments it looks like a star to me - maybe it would be fuzzy in a darker sky.

Using a pair of binoculars at 15x magnification the comet is much like the pictures as seen <a href="http://www.skyandtelescope.com/observing/home/10862521.html">here</a> , with the exception of the faint green haze outside the brighter disk.

It looked bigger than I expected, and I noticed thet in order to get the most from the view, I had to use "averted vision" that is focusing the view a bit away from the comet. The brighter core is a little elliptic looking and a little offset from the centre of the disk.

If you have a pair of binoculars, you should go out and take a look. The Sky and Telescope link above gives you what you need to find the comet.

This is the third comet I have seen, only Hale-Bopp in April 1997 was bright enough to be clearly seen in the heavily light polluted skies of the western Netherlands, but this unexpected view is much better with a pair of binoculars , or better a telescope using a not too high magnification 20 - 50x should be fine.

Good luck comet hunting.