Webmaster  © Paul L Money 2010

 

‘Bright’ Comets for the year?

Comets are notoriously difficult to predict how bright they may become but 2010 has two possibly visible ‘bright’ comets, Comet McNaught (C/2009 R1) in June and Comet Hartley 2 (103P) best seen in October. There is a third but Comet Encke will be very close to the Sun in the sky at perihelion so not really observable from the UK.

 

Comet McNaught R1 was discovered in September 2009 and although it did become technically ‘naked eye’ it’s position and time of visibility occurring in June meant that it was always a difficult object for the UK and Ireland. It became too low in very low haze to be seen at the end of June so it’s not expected to be visible for the above areas as I’d hoped for when I originally wrote Nightscenes 2010 back in 2009. Nonetheless I did manage to capture a few images of it during June and they are here for you to enjoy.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Comet Hartley 103P also known as Comet Hartley 2

 

 

Comet Hartley 2 (103P) holds reasonable promise as our second Comet candidate for September through to the end of the year. We pick it up in Lacerta on Sept 1st when it may be mag 8.5* and visible in binoculars high in the eastern sky at midnight. It quickly passes into Cassiopeia when it might have brightened to mag 6.5. On the 11th it passes close to the naked eye star Eta Perseii for a great photo op. It should continue to brighten as it rapidly moves through Perseus after a quick dip into Camelopardalis. On the 19th (right)  Hartley 2 may have reached mag 5.5 and lies close to Epsilon Aurigae. The comet may reach it’s brightest of possibly mag 5 or 4.7 on Oct 22nd with it lying near M38. Over the next few evenings unfortunately moonlight may spoil the view and wash out the comet as it heads down into Gemini. It reaches perihelion on the 28th but the moon lies close by and will probably drown it out.

After this it is better to view the comet later into the night as it moves downwards into Monoceros during November fading as it does so (left). In the early hours of Nov 28th it may have faded to mag 6.8 when it lies amongst the stars of Messier 47, a bright splashy open cluster to the left of Sirius, the Dog star. It ends the year just in Canis Major but well placed to continue viewing once again before midnight.

 

* By August 2010 it was noted that Comet Hartley 2 was about 2 magnitudes fainter than predicted so we can only hope it brightens up more!