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Corkscrew Meteor Mystery While photographing the recently discovered comet Machholz the other night, Jimmy Westlake's mind wandered back to a mystery that'd been bugging him for years. On Jan. 1, 1986, he was photographing another comet, Halley's, through his homemade 8-inch reflecting telescope. "About one minute into the exposure, I watched a meteor zip through the field of the telescope," said Westlake, a professor of physical sciences at Colorado Mountain College in Steamboat Springs, CO. "I stopped the exposure at two minutes." That night, when he developed the roll of slide film, he was astounded at what he saw: "Crossing...

A COMET that appeared in the night sky over Christmas has invited comparisons with the Star of Bethlehem. But it is amateur astronomers with telescopes and binoculars who are pursuing the object rather than Wise Men bearing gifts. Comet Machholz will be at its most visible tomorrow and Thursday. Even then it will be no more than a faint smudge of light difficult to see with the naked eye. A pair of binoculars pointing south should pick it out near the Pleiades star cluster. Comets have been proposed as an explanation for the star that guided the Three Wise Men...

A comet discovered earlier this year has now moved close enough to be visible without binoculars or telescopes by experienced observers under dark skies. It is expected to put on a modest show this month and into January. Comet Machholz will be at its closest to Earth Jan. 5-6, 2005, when it will be 32 million miles (51 million kilometers) away. People with dark rural skies and a good map should be able to find it on Moon-free nights now into January. Backyard astronomers have been watching Machholz for months through telescopes. It was spotted by naked-eye observers for the...

Go out in the open tonight after your dinner and look to the south east of the dark sky. See whether you can spot a celestial body with blue gas tail and the edge of an orange-yellowish dust tail emerging at very different angles from the coma. That’s comet Machholz. The comet also code named as C/2004 Q2 is the 10th comet discovered by Don Machholz of Colfax, California, on August 27th. The comet will be closest to earth on Sunday and Monday, when it will be 32 million miles away. This is close in astronomical terms. It will be...

Comet Machholz (Comet 2004 Q2) Page Comet Machholz is current overhead in the early evening. Comet hunter (and SJAA club member) Don Machholz discovered it last August. How he discovered the comet was described in his article in the SJAA Ephemeris. The comet is now nearly overhead at California latitudes. In a dark sky it should be visible as a non distinct patch of light. As of January 4, 2005 it was even visible within the San Jose city limits. Unfortunately the weather there has not been cooperating. The comet is easily visible in telescope finder or binoculars

Clearing skies over the high desert will finally give stargazers a chance to peer at Comet Machholz, the noticeably green comet that has been transiting constellations above the southeastern horizon for several months. The comet, a faint glowing "fuzzball" detectable with the unaided eye, is now arcing upward through the lower portion of the constellation Perseus and can easily be seen with binoculars. To find Comet Machholz, look toward the southeast after complete darkness, preferably in an area that is distant from street lights. Find the lowest recognizable constellation, Orion. It appears as a long box of four bright stars,...