Posts Made By: K. Michael Malolepszy

January's Surprise Comet

January 4, 2007

by Roger W. Sinnott

A major comet, known as Comet McNaught or C/2006 P1,
is right now making its way through the inner solar
system. It’s already as bright as the brightest stars,
but it is also sticking close to the glare of the Sun.
For this reason the general public won’t be gathering
on street corners to gaze at it, as they did Comet
Hyakutake (in 1996) or Comet Hale-Bopp (1997). But
amateur astronomers in north-temperate latitudes, with
their observing know-how, have an excellent chance of
spotting Comet McNaught in the next week or so, very
low in the bright glow of evening twilight.

More at

http://skytonight.com/observing/home/5089276.html

Chart at

http://media.skytonight.com/images/WebVic_McNaught_525.jpg

Map at

http://www.skyhound.com/sh/comets.html

Ephemeris at

http://cfa-www.harvard.edu/iau/Ephemerides/Comets/2006P1.html

http://www.aerith.net/comet/catalog/2006P1/2006P1.html

Images at

http://www.aerith.net/comet/catalog/2006P1/pictures.html

Anyone see the new Orion 7.1" Mak-Cass that is on the 2nd page of the most recent US Orion catalog?

http://www.telescope.com/shopping/product/detailmain.jsp?itemID=251476&itemType=PRODUCT&iMainCat=4&iSubCat=10&iProductID=251476

GWB's doppleganger (funny):

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-1921276117304287501&q=genre:comedy**this

Pluto-Bound New Horizons Spacecraft Gets a Boost from
Jupiter

http://pluto.jhuapl.edu/news_center/news/022807.htm

NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft successfully completed
a flyby of Jupiter early this morning, using the
massive planet’s gravity to pick up speed on its
3-billion mile voyage to Pluto and the unexplored
Kuiper Belt region beyond.

“We’re on our way to Pluto,” says New Horizons Mission
Operations Manager Alice Bowman, of the Johns Hopkins
University Applied Physics Laboratory (APL) in Laurel,
Md. “The swingby was a success; the spacecraft is on
course and performed just as we expected.”

Mission images at

http://pluto.jhuapl.edu/gallery/missionPhotos.html

Including our closest look yet at Great Red Spot Jr.:

http://pluto.jhuapl.edu/gallery/missionPhotos/pages/022807_3.html

Mission Home Page at

http://pluto.jhuapl.edu/

An unbelievable image - by an amateur from the ground
- of the ISS & space shuttle Atlantis at

http://media.skytonight.com/images/Dantowitz_ISS_shuttle_full.jpg

Article at

http://www.skyandtelescope.com/community/skyblog/home/8223297.html

It looks like in the early morning of July 23 2007, Comet C/2006 VZ13 (LINEAR) will be very close to globular cluster M3 - about a degree or so. For more details, see

http://www.astromart.com/forums/viewpost.asp?forum_post_id=534743&poll_id=&news_id=&page=

It looks like in the early morning of July 23 2007, Comet C/2006 VZ13
(LINEAR) will be very close to globular cluster M3 - about a degree or
so. As of early July, 2007, it is reported to be around mag 7-8,
bright enough to be seen in 10X50mm binoculars according to some
friends of mine. For recent magnitude estimates, see
http://www.cfa.harvard.edu/icq/CometMags.html

>From C/2006 VZ13 (LINEAR)--Daily Ephemeris at

http://www.cfa.harvard.edu/iau/Ephemerides/Comets/2006VZ13_1.html

and using the ephemeris generator at http://www.cfa.harvard.edu/iau/MPEph/MPEph.html

it gives these coords (times in UT):

2007 07 23 0500 13 42 34.1 +27 37 36
2007 07 23 0600 13 42 22.2 +27 31 11
2007 07 23 0700 13 42 10.3 +27 24 47
2007 07 23 0800 13 41 58.5 +27 18 23

NED Equatorial (J2000.0) data for M3: 13h 42m 11.22s +28d 22m 31.6s

Unfortunately for North America, on Monday, July 23, a waxing gibbous
moon will be interfering until it sets a little after midnight - by
then that part of sky will be getting quite low for mid northern
latitudes.

Finder charts for C/2006 VZ13 (LINEAR) at

http://www.cometchasing.skyhound.com/index.html

http://www.cometchasing.skyhound.com/comets/2006_VZ13.gif

C/2006 VZ13 (LINEAR) Orbital Elements at

http://cfa-www.harvard.edu/iau/Ephemerides/Comets/2006VZ13.html

Daily Ephemeris at

http://www.cfa.harvard.edu/iau/Ephemerides/Comets/2006VZ13_1.html

Images, brightness predictions at

http://www.aerith.net/comet/catalog/2006VZ13/2006VZ13.html

Heavens-Above data & diagrams at

http://www.heavens-above.com/

Orbital diagrams can be played with at

http://ssd.jpl.nasa.gov/sbdb.cgi?sstr=2006%20VZ13;orb=1

Good imaging opportunity?

It looks like in the early morning of July 23 2007, Comet C/2006 VZ13
(LINEAR) will be very close to globular cluster M3 - about a degree or
so. See my post at

http://www.astromart.com/forums/viewpost.asp?forum_post_id=534743&poll_id=&news_id=&page=

http://www.aavso.org/publications/specialnotice/55.shtml

CBET 1027 reports that Hiroshi Abe has discovered
a new bright nova around August 8, at coordinates

19:54:24.64
+20:52:51.9
J2000

and with brightness V=9.4mag. A possible progenitor
star is visible on the POSS-I survey plates at
about V=18.

This sounds like an ideal target for northern observers.
You can plot the field using VSP:

http://www.aavso.org/observing/charts/vsp/index.html

and entering the coordinates given above. This is about
7arcmin from SS Vul, a Mira that is not on the AAVSO
program. We will create a sequence for the new nova
as soon as possible.

This weekend the asteroid Vesta is very close to Jupiter in the sky, making it easy to find:

From the article at:

http://www.skyandtelescope.com/observing/home/9427376.html

"....At closest approach, on August 29th, Vesta appears just 0.4° from Jupiter, less than four times as far as Callisto, Jupiter's outermost moon. And the asteroid will be within 0.6° of the planet from August 28th to the 31st..."