New Comet visible in scopes

[MeteorWayne]

http://www.space.com/spacewatch/newfoun ... 01108.html

Ikeya-Murakami (C/2010 V1)

The comet, called Ikeya-Murakami (C/2010 V1), was first detected last week by amateur astronomers in Japan, but several other skywatchers have since been watching the icy wanderer's changing appearance over the last few days

Image: http://www.space.com/php/multimedia/ima ... %2Fa%3E%5D

Bright new comet discovered visually by Kaoru Ikeya and Shigeki Murakami. It locates near by Saturn in the morning sky. It looks similar to 17P/Holmes. So it seems to be soon after an outburst.

Date(TT) R.A. (2000) Decl. Delta r Elong. m1 Best Time(A, h)
Nov. 6 12 40.58 -2 46.0 2.492 1.745 32 8.3 4:59 (284, 14)
Nov. 13 12 58.37 -5 6.6 2.473 1.756 34 8.4 5:05 (288, 16)

It's currently quite close to Saturn, rising in the eastern sky just before dawn. Looks to be cloudy for me this morning, but should be clear tomorrow morning. Since I'll be out meteor observing (Leonids and Taurids), I'll bring a scope out to cool down while I watch the whole sky.

from Sky and Tel: http://www.skyandtelescope.com/resource ... 35518.html

Comet Ikeya-Murakami
Date ... RA ....... Dec ..... Elong
Nov. 5... 12 38.0 ...-02 26 ....32.6
Nov. 7... 12 43.1 ...-03 06 ....33.2
Nov. 9 ...12 48.2 ...-03 47 ....33.8
Nov. 11.. 12 53.3 ...-04 27.... 34.4
Nov. 13.. 12 58.3 ...-05 06 ....35.0
Nov. 15.. 13 03.4 ...-05 46 ....35.


sbdb page:


http://ssd.jpl.nasa.gov/sbdb.cgi?sstr=C ... ;cad=0#orb

(Precise Ephemeris using the latest data is available on this page)

 

[adrenalynn]

I think Mag 8 is a bit of a reach from my view last night. A bit of a light pollution issue, but it was only juuuuust visible in a 5" scope. The 10" gave a good view of it.

 

[MeteorWayne]

I meant to look this morning but got up late and had to go almost to nautical twilight to get 2 full hours in for meteor watch, so by then it was too light. Thanx for the comments, when I get up there tonight I'll drag out one of the bigger dobs from our collection and let it cool while I observe (I think we have a 12"), then take a break before astro twilight to take a look.

Did see my first 3 Leonids of the year, a late Orionid, and active Northern Taurids.

MW

 

[adrenalynn]

Awesome! I'm running late on all my projects right now. I'm not sure I'll have my radio telescope done for any of the big showers this year. Not like I haven't been working on that down converter for the last couple years or anything...

We do have a new DSS non-amplified camera just recently came in that's supposed to resolve down to 0.00001 lux. I'm sorely tempted to steal one from the warehouse and point it at the sky here.

 

[MeteorWayne]

If you need advice on SW to use, LMK! :shock:

http://www.imo.net/video

 

[adrenalynn]

Actually - I'd love that. Sorry - this is probably OT, but I'm familiar with MetRec - it's designed for the incredibly antiquated and unusable Matrox frame grabbers. UFO Capture is about 2x the price of a camera and doesn't seem frequently maintained. So I was leaning towards writing my own. If there's something else out there, I'd like to know!

I wrote an ImageMagick script to process thousands of photos and flag the ones with streaks in them, along with an accompanying histogram. I did that back in the Aurigid shower. Finding meteors in a few thousand photos stinks. I was kinda thinking I'd just break the video down into merged frames and search it the same way.

 

[MeteorWayne]

Yes, too far OT. I'll PM you. Our NJAA All-sky camera hasn't recovered yet from a springtime lightning strike.