Comet McNaught now visible on SOHO satellite

SOlar and Heliospheric Observatory ^ | 11 JAN 07 | TXnMA

[TXnMA]

Comet McNaught has just made its appearance in the SOHO (SOlar and Heliospheric Observatory) "LASCO-3" field (at about the 11:00 position) -- and it is very bright!!

The real-time image is viewable at http://sohowww.nascom.nasa.gov/data/LATEST/current_c3small.mpg.

In the next couple of days, the 48-hr MPEGs of the SOHO LASCO-3 field at

http://sohowww.nascom.nasa.gov/data/LATEST/current_c3small.mpg

should be well worth watching.

~~~~~~

(The above URL is for the small (256 X 256) MPEG. The larger (512 X 512) MPEG at

http://sohowww.nascom.nasa.gov/data/LATEST/current_c3.mpg

appears to have a problem at present.)

[TXnMA]

First look at Comet McNaught on SOHO:

[TXnMA]

Correction: the single-frame real-time SOHO LASCO-3 image URL is

http://sohowww.nascom.nasa.gov/data/realtime/c3/512/

[WSGilcrest]

From SF bay area tonight.

[TXnMA]

To save FR bandwidth, I recommend the smaller (256X256) image at

http://sohowww.nascom.nasa.gov/data/realtime/c3/256/latest.gif

for anyone who wants to post updates here on FR...

[Howlin]

What time was that?

[TXnMA]

Beautiful photo!!! Congratulations on being able to see the real thing!

For experiences of others, you might check orlando's earlier thread.

[TXnMA]

BTW, that's Mercury below and to left of center in the SOHO image. In the SOHO MPGs, you can see it movin' right along...

[WSGilcrest]

5:41p

[steve86]

The head appeared quite bright to me, looking through the crystal clear skies of an arctic cold front, against the backdrop of a still illuminated orange-brown twilight. The McNaught head looked like a speck of a welding arc or something.

Apparently the overall magnitude is about -3. If the comet were seen against a black rural sky it would truly be brilliant, like a torch in a cave.

Looking forward to following the progress of the "Bearded Star". The luminance of this one was unexpected. At present the apparent size is small, much smaller than other comets I've seen, but the brilliance is unsurpassed in my lifetime.

[WSGilcrest]

Couldn't see Mercury, but got a nice shot of Venus over Mt. Tamalpais after the comet set.

[TXnMA]

Nice, indeed! I guess I was so frustrated with not being able to find McNaught, that I never even thought about photographing Venus...

Now that you mention it, the small size may have thrown me off. I was looking for something on the order of Kouhoutek or Ikeya-Seki (which I saw and photographed..)

[steve86]

Maybe "one half inch" or less at arm length under the conditions I viewed it. In nighttime conditions I'm sure the tail would appear to extend much farther. In my 20 power binoculars, the comet really didn't take up that much of the field.

[1COUNTER-MORTER-68]

KKomet for KKids ping...;0)

[Recovering_Democrat]

very cool. out of this world, even. ;-)

[ExSoldier]

very cool. out of this world, even. ;-)

At least everybody's looking in the right direction, which is to say: UP!!

I'd love to know what the incidence of comets sighted by man has been in history? Hailey's comes around once every 87 years. I saw that in 1986, IIRC. I was about 29 years old. Up to that point I'd not seen any comet in my lifetime. Since then there have been two more....Khoutec and this one. Doesn't the Bible say in the last days...there will be strange signs in the heavens? Maybe somewhere in the Book of Matthew?

[Orlando]

It's @ 76 million miles from Earth and it will pass within @ 17 million miles from the Sun.
Mercury is 27 million miles from the Sun.

Here's a images from SOHO of Venus, Mercury and other planets from Lasco 3 (SOHO).This can give us a idea of size ?!?

http://sohowww.nascom.nasa.gov/hotshots/2000_05_03/lasco_c3v3.jpg

[Quix]

Great questions. Please let me know if you find out the frequency over the last several hundred years.

[kkmo9]

Tanks, Count! If the snow lets up tonite, we'll go look for it!

(Snowed from 1 PM yesterday afternoon till present... nonstop... from light flurries to heavy blankets... real perdy, but tough to see thru!)

[ExSoldier]

COMETS

From June of 2004 till today (JAN 12 2007) ten comets have been visible from the earth. A "Periodic Comet" is one that has been visible at least once from earth in the last two hundred years. The list of those is about 182 objects long.