| | ISON now visible to naked eye due to recent outburst. |  |
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GROUNDZERO
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 |  Subject: ISON now visible to naked eye due to recent outburst.  Fri Nov 15, 2013 7:12 pm | |
| Get ready for a stellar show. The much-anticipated Comet ISON is now visible to the naked eye according to reports from many observers.Comet ISON — the potential "comet of the century" — has suddenly brightened in an outburst of activity with just two weeks to go before it literally grazes the surface of the sun.
[url=http://pinterest.com/pin/create/button/?url=http%3A//www.space.com/23591-comet-ison-visibility-naked-eye.html&media=http://i.space.com/images/i/000/034/419/original/comet-ison-nov-14-bruce-gary.jpg?1384464375&description=Amateur astronomer Bruce Gary captured this view of the brightening Comet ISON on Nov. 14%2C 2013%2C from Hereford%2C Ariz.
][/url] Amateur astronomer Bruce Gary captured this view of the brightening Comet ISON on Nov. 14, 2013, from Hereford, Ariz.
Credit: Bruce Gary
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In recent months, Comet ISON has repeatedly befuddled forecasters trying to anticipate just how bright it will ultimately become. But earlier this week, the comet's brightening trend again seemed to sputtering and stalling, but more recent observations suggest a sudden and radical upsurge in brightness. [Photos of Comet ISON: A Potentially Great Comet]Comet ISON lightens up, literallyComet ISON is now in full outburst mode, becoming many times brighter over just the past few days. Astronomers measure the brightness of objects in the night sky as magnitude, in which the brighter an object is, the lower its magnitude number. The human eye can perceive objects as faint as magnitude +6.5.
[url=http://pinterest.com/pin/create/button/?url=http%3A//www.space.com/23591-comet-ison-visibility-naked-eye.html&media=http://i.space.com/images/i/000/034/271/original/comet-ison-singapore-ng.jpg?1383950469&description=Photographer and amateur astronomer Justin Ng of Singapore captured this view of Comet ISON on Nov. 4%2C 2013.
][/url]Photographer and amateur astronomer Justin Ng of Singapore captured this view of Comet ISON on Nov. 4, 2013.
Credit: Justin Ng/www.justinngphoto.comAccording to veteran comet observer, John Bortle, Comet ISON was shining only at magnitude +8.5 on Monday (Nov. 11) morning — more than six times too dim to be visible to the unaided eye. But by Wednesday morning, the comet’s brightness had increased three-fold brightening to +7.3. [8 Essential Facts About Comet ISON]If that was a surprise, an even bigger one was waiting for Bortle on Thursday morning (Nov. 14)."Ready to go at 4:45 a.m. but I couldn't figure out what the funny-looking, blotted, star that came into view was," Bortle said. "[Was my] seeing that bad? But, no, the 'blotted star' was, in fact, at the comet's position! Getting to the point, the little but intensely condensed, globular cluster-looking comet was a whopping magnitude 5.4 — two full magnitudes brighter than just 24 hours ago! This makes for a three magnitude total rise since my observation on Monday."
#1 rated Beginner Telescope. Celestron NexStar 130SLT Computerized Telescope. Buy Here
Credit: Space.com Store
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In just 72 hours, Comet ISON increased nearly 16 times in brightness.Carl Hergenrother, acting co-coordinator of the comet section of the Association of Lunar and Planetary Observers, has confirmed Bortle's observations."ISON has dramatically brightened over the past few days," Hergenrother told SPACE.com via email. "The latest observations put the comet around magnitude 5.7 to 6.1 which is a 2+ magnitude increase from this weekend. My own observations from this morning in 10x50 and 30x125 binocularsshow a nice 'lollipop' comet with a very condensed blue-green head and a long narrow tail. The tail was over 1 degree in length even in the 10x50s. The comet may continue to brighten as the outburst is still in its early stages." | |
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GROUNDZERO
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| | Subject: Re: ISON now visible to naked eye due to recent outburst. Fri Nov 15, 2013 7:21 pm | |
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| | Subject: Re: ISON now visible to naked eye due to recent outburst. Fri Nov 15, 2013 7:27 pm | |
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quietobserver
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| | Subject: Re: ISON now visible to naked eye due to recent outburst. Fri Nov 15, 2013 9:15 pm | |
| Hey cool Groundzero. I now live out in BFE & just bought a Celestron telescope. Looks like I can reach out and touch the stars before I scope 'em, then it takes all night to find was I was looking at with my naked eye lol. Haven't seen sky this clear since I spent a lot of time in St Moritz & Zermat, although that was before the Italian smog crept north...(well smog & other 'things') | |
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GROUNDZERO
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| | Subject: Re: ISON now visible to naked eye due to recent outburst. Sat Nov 16, 2013 2:16 pm | |
| - quietobserver wrote:
- Hey cool Groundzero. I now live out in BFE & just bought a Celestron telescope. Looks like I can reach out and touch the stars before I scope 'em, then it takes all night to find was I was looking at with my naked eye lol. Haven't seen sky this clear since I spent a lot of time in St Moritz & Zermat, although that was before the Italian smog crept north...(well smog & other 'things')
Dude we MUST be brothers... telescope viewing is new for me too and hope fully DONE can coach us a little more in the finer points. Speaking of DONE...where are you? Either way, I think it is breaking up...we'll see very soon. Fukushima + a/several come strikes...hope not. | |
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quietobserver
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| | Subject: Re: ISON now visible to naked eye due to recent outburst. Sat Nov 16, 2013 7:55 pm | |
| - GROUNDZERO wrote:
- quietobserver wrote:
- Hey cool Groundzero. I now live out in BFE & just bought a Celestron telescope. Looks like I can reach out and touch the stars before I scope 'em, then it takes all night to find was I was looking at with my naked eye lol. Haven't seen sky this clear since I spent a lot of time in St Moritz & Zermat, although that was before the Italian smog crept north...(well smog & other 'things')
Dude we MUST be brothers... telescope viewing is new for me too and hope fully DONE can coach us a little more in the finer points. Speaking of DONE...where are you?
Either way, I think it is breaking up...we'll see very soon. Fukushima + a/several come strikes...hope not. With no disrespect intended, I'm the Stevie Wonder of the telescope. My first great discovery was a midwest casino spotlight. It looks like quite the find from a long ways away, but after a bit of investigation; the slots and blackjack are at no risk to me or anyone else for that matter. I just emailed 'done' to the two email addresses I have on file. | |
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Delfi
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| | Subject: Re: ISON now visible to naked eye due to recent outburst. Sun Nov 17, 2013 11:08 am | |
| I got up at 4 central time but the clouds were racing across the sky and I couldn't get a clear view. Maybe tonight. | |
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| | Subject: Re: ISON now visible to naked eye due to recent outburst. Sun Nov 17, 2013 11:35 am | |
| I was up at 4:30-ish am looking for it this morning too but I have such a terrible view east that by the time the sun got high enough to maybe see anything close to it the glare washed everything out. Maybe I'll have to pack the dogs up and drive up into the mountains to get a decent early morning eastern view. !! FOXTROT JULIET BRAVO !! | |
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GROUNDZERO
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| | Subject: Re: ISON now visible to naked eye due to recent outburst. Sun Nov 17, 2013 2:06 pm | |
| RARE DOUBLE-COMET FLYBY OF MERCURY: NASA's MESSENGER spacecraft is about to get a close-up view of Comet ISON's outburst. On Nov. 18-19 Comet ISON and Comet Encke both will fly by Mercury, the planet MESSENGER is orbiting. You can learn more about this rare double-comet flyby and what MESSENGER might see in a video from Science@NASA. COMET ISON UPDATE: Reports of naked-eye sightings of Comet ISON are coming in from around the world. Experienced observers put the comet's magntitude at +5.5 on Nov. 16th. This means it is now fully 10 times brighter than it was only three days ago before the outburst. To the naked eye, ISON appears as a faint smudge of pale green light low in the pre-dawn sky. The view through a telescope is more dramatic. The comet's tail has become a riotous crowd of gaseous streamers stretching more than 3.5 degrees across the sky. Amateur astronomer Waldemar Skorupa sends this picture from Kahler Asten, Germany: The tail is so long, he couldn't fit the whole thing in the field of view. How long is it? Comet ISON's tail extends more than 8 million kilometers behind the comet's nucleus. For comparison, that's 21 times the distance between Earth and the Moon. Because so much gas and dust is spewing from the comet's core, it is impossible to see clearly what caused Comet ISON's outburst on Nov. 13-14. One possibility is that fresh veins of ice are opening up in the comet's nucleus, vaporizing furiously as ISON approaches the sun. Another possibility is that the nucleus has completely fragmented. "If so, it will still be several days before we know for sure," says Karl Battams, an astronomer with NASA's Comet ISON Observing Campaign. "When comet nuclei fall apart, it’s not like a shrapnel-laden explosion. Instead, the chunks slowly drift apart at slightly different speeds. Given that ISON’s nucleus is shrouded in such a tremendous volume of light-scattering dust and gas right now, it will be almost impossible to determine this for at least a few days and perhaps not until the comet reaches the field of view of NASA's STEREO HI-1A instrument on November 21, 2013. We will have to wait for the chunks to drift apart a sufficient distance, assuming they don't crumble first." In short, no one knows for sure what is happening to Comet ISON. This could be the comet's death throes--or just the first of many brightening events the comet experiences as it plunges toward the sun for a close encounter on Thanksgiving Day (Nov. 28th). Monitoring is encouraged. Comet ISON rises in the east just before the sun. Amateur astronomers, if you have a GOTO telescope, enter these coordinates. Dates of special interest include Nov. 17th and 18th when the comet will pass the bright star Spica, making ISON extra-easy to find. Sky maps: Nov. 15, 16, 17, 18,19. | |
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GROUNDZERO
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| | Subject: Re: ISON now visible to naked eye due to recent outburst. Sun Nov 17, 2013 2:17 pm | |
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quietobserver
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| | Subject: Re: ISON now visible to naked eye due to recent outburst. Sun Nov 17, 2013 5:26 pm | |
| Potentially Dazzling Comet ISON Now Visible to Naked Eye After Outburst
"In just 72 hours, Comet ISON increased nearly 16 times in brightness.....The comet may continue to brighten as the outburst is still in its early stages."
http://www.space.com/23591-comet-ison-visibility-naked-eye.html | |
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| | Subject: Re: ISON now visible to naked eye due to recent outburst. Sun Nov 17, 2013 5:31 pm | |
| That thing is A LOT HIGHER on the horizon than I thought. I was expecting to have to see it much closer to the ground level. Maybe there is a chance of seeing it from my house after all. Thanks for that picture.  | |
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GROUNDZERO
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| | Subject: Re: ISON now visible to naked eye due to recent outburst. Sun Nov 17, 2013 5:41 pm | |
| Yeah, I knew when I saw it that it would help for perspcetive. Good binoculars are fine for viewing now...so no excuses guys... | |
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| | Subject: Re: ISON now visible to naked eye due to recent outburst. Sun Nov 17, 2013 6:30 pm | |
| And I do have a very good binocular. 7X, 35mm Bushnell wide field. Probably 35-40 years old and heavy as an anvil. I just hung 'em on the doorknob. Hope the skies stay clear. !! FOXTROT JULIET BRAVO !! | |
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quietobserver
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| | Subject: Re: ISON now visible to naked eye due to recent outburst. Sun Nov 17, 2013 7:42 pm | |
| - researcher wrote:
- And I do have a very good binocular. 7X, 35mm Bushnell wide field. Probably 35-40 years old and heavy as an anvil. I just hung 'em on the doorknob. Hope the skies stay clear.
Careful not to ruin the doorknob...lol I have an old pair of Zeiss that are like moving an old CRT T.V. everytime you use them. Gives me a neck ache just thinking about 'em. | |
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