Monday, July 27, 2020

Super Powers? I'm Waiting.

When Comet C/2020 F3 (NEOWISE) was a morning object, I managed to observe it by taking a trek down the road and peering around the neighbor's monster magnolia trees.

It was naked eye visible, without averted vision, and was beautiful through binoculars.

I kept an eye on its progress through several mornings, and even captured a nice image of it with my Google Pixel 3XL Android phone.

Comet NEOWISE
Click here to see my blog entry!

So, now that Comet NEOWISE is an evening object, what does that mean to me?

Super powers!

This is my image of the comet from Saturday night.  Seeing conditions were good and the comet was positioned nicely in the sky, letting me use my Cat from the driveway.

Comet C/2020 F3 NEOWISE, as seen with my Celestron CPC1100 and ZWO ASI294MC on July 26th, 2020 at 0230 UTC.

NEOWISE, when it transitioned into an evening object, was difficult to see at first because it was so low above the horizon.  It was in the northwestern sky, not terribly far away from where the sun was setting. The sky was bright in the early evening.  Mountains were in the way.  And clouds.  Shoo, clouds!

I would go outside nightly with binoculars hoping to find it.

Success, finally!  Once I found it with binoculars, it was easy to find with the naked eye, too.  NEOWISE, as an evening object was still a naked eye object,  And its tail was visible, too!

It turns out that the comet was visible from inside our house through the master bedroom windows.  In fact, I can honestly say that while lying in bed, I could see the comet in the sky, shining its light on me.

I have fallen asleep to comet light!

I'm waiting for my super powers to start.

Captain Comet, was a superhero in the DC Universe.  His super powers, were activated by a passing comet.

It's my turn!😎











9 comments:

  1. Awesome image! Hm, maybe Super 'Stronomer! Cosmic Coffee-er!

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  2. That's a great image through the telescope. I set my alarm a couple of weekends ago to go out and see it in the pre-dawn hour, but I forgot to turn on any sound for the alarm and didn't wake up until dawn. :-( But we did make it out several evenings to look at it in the hour after twilight. It was gorgeous.

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    Replies
    1. Thanks! I was a little concerned that the field of view of the Cat at 0.62 degrees was going to be too small to do the comet's tail justice. It turned out okay. When I saw it earlier in the week with my small "grab and go" scope, the comet's tail filled the eyepiece and its field of view was a full 2 degrees. It was beautiful.

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  3. I’ll challenge your super powers by drinking moon water! Just kidding. Cool pictures :)

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  4. One day, we will launch our IR Satellite and maybe even get up there, in person. One day. Maybe.

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  5. So Mars is next.
    I am delighted by the views in September! Hoping Oct is even better. Next close up is 2035!!

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    Replies
    1. I plan to be downloaded into my new super powered robot body by then, so I'll be okay in 2035.

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