From: "Nick Martin" N.Martin@au.sac.ac.uk
Date: Thu, 27 Feb 1997 08:52:49 +0000
Subject: Hale Bopp in infra red plus Zodiacal light
Last night, feb. 26 at about 19.30UT I observed comet Hale Bopp using 9X63 binoculars and a Lynx1 night sight using its long focus lens giving about x3 magnification (order of magnitude estimate).
The Linx long focus lens has an integral infra red viewing filter with a cut off in the far red. The image of the comet seen in infra red was very different from the visible light. The coma appeared much more evenly illuminated. the asymmetry caused by the southern jet was not nearly so obvious. The coma appeared broader and more rounded, more like the exhaust plume of a rocket at high altitude than the swept back "comet" shape so obvious in visible light. There was ºwhat looked like a conspicuous jet at a position angle of about 300 degrees but this followed the edge of the apparent coma so could be a line of sight effect looking through the thickness of the leading edge of the infra red coma plume.
What this observation shows is that it would be a worthwhile goal of those with CCD cameras to fit a infra red transmitting filter a try to get some images in the infra red as they may show a quite different picture from that in visible light.
My other personal sucess last night was to see for the first time in my 54 years the zodiacal light. I was observing from a seaside cliff top car park looking west into a very clear sky with scattered patches of cloud. The clouds in the west cleared and saw to my great delight the zodiacal light. It was immediatly obvious what it was, a large beautiful diffuse cone of pearly bluish ligh. As time passed the setting cone became narrower and more elongated in the direction of Taurus reaching almost as far as the Pleiades. Sadly I did not have a camera with me but this first mental impression is sufficiently memorable.
Nick Martin
Ayrshire, Scotland, UK
From: Ian G. gore_i@chefs.enet.dec.com
Date: Fri, 21 Feb 97 12:19:15 MET
Subject: RE: Hale-Bopp Nucleus spliting ?
Andres Valencia wrote;
>Translation:
>2-20-97, 4H 50' UT, 4 main matter waves split from cometary nucleus, >observed at 260X, C-14, images on C-14 with ST-6A F7, direction >Northeast-East, Magnitude 1.1, please forward this information.
>Mallorca-OAM Astronomical Observatory
>Can any of you confirm ?
I can't *confirm* it, but I was observing HB exactly 1 hour later and saw 2, maybe 3, bright spots that appeared detached from the nucleus, in those positions. This was at x60 with my 8.75" dob. I tried at x100 but the view was worse. I had another look a few minutes later, and the separation of the eastern spot appeared more distinct. The sky was lightening rapidly by now, so I attributed this to the fine detail being washed out.
Ian G.
From: George Zay GeoZay@aol.com
Date: Wed, 19 Feb 1997 10:20:43 -0500 (EST)
Subject: Hale/Bopp Observation Feb 19 ZAYGE
I made another pre work trip to my observatory to photograph comet Hale/Bopp under 6.0 and clear skies. Again using my 4 inch at f/5 made two photographs...a 23 minute with color print film and the other a 28 minute exposure with t-max 400 film. The comet appears to be brighter to me this morning. Bright enough to give it a 1.3 if you condense the nucleus and coma....this is equaling Deneb. As for it's tail...I give the dust tail a 2.5 degrees and if you add the very dim ion tail, I get a total of 4 degrees.
George Zay
From: "Tony Cecce, Corning, NY" CECCE_AJ@CORNING.COM
Date: Mon, Wed, 19 Feb 1997 09:44:38 -0500 (EST)
Subject: Re: Comet Hale-Bopp and the Public
Several thoughts come to mind for lack of current interest:
This thing has been around a long time and will be around for some time yet.
It is not yet an easy object to observe
It is a morning object now.
In several weeks it will be a prime time object.*
It's best showing is predicted to be while it is an evening object.
I'm sure it will be a popular thing (if it gets easy to observe) when it moves into the evening sky. This comet may not be as large as Hyakutake in dark skies, but the brightness it is displaying so far indicates it may be much better than Hyakutake in urban skies which would helps its media popularity.
For the amateur astronomer (especially those who appreciate the uniqueness of every comet, and those who enjoy following the changes of a comet as it passes through our neighborhood, and those who live on the edge of thier seat waiting for the next discovery) this is a very exciting time.
This comet is displaying such magnificent detail and brightness already. I could see the tail through the windshield of the van the other morning (2/16/97) as I drove to darker skies. Naked eye the dust tail was easy to see for close to two degrees, the ion trail could be glimpsed out to seven degrees. I estimated the brightness naked eye as 1.1, slightly brighter then Deneb, much dimmer than Altair. It fit in quite well with the summer triangle (or could we say summer trapezium?), although the fuzziness and distinct blue color of the coma gave it away. Through binoculars the tails could be followed a longer distance where it was lost in the summer milky way, the bright nuceus appeared to be oblong.
A telescope revealed the true nature of the nucleus. It had a dazzling bright stellar nucleus with a bright jet (actually fountain is a better word) coming from the southeast quarter. This jet was quickly swept back into the tail, the northern edge of the jet bending early 180 degrees while the southern edge bent 90 degree, within several arc minutes of the nucleus. Even through a small 5.5" dob the brightness of the nuclear structure was nearly blinding.
We are not yet to the climax of a multi year show. I can't imagine observational astronomy getting any better than this.
Carpe noctum,
(*) It will also be a morning object. In fact, for northern locations the head will be circumpolar. It will set for only a few hours here at 42oN, with a possible circumpolar tail sticking above the northern horizon.
Tony
From: Peter Nicholl nichopr@FREESPACE.NET
Date: Tue, 18 Feb 1997 01:20:25 -0500
Subject: Hale-Bopp at last - telescopic
Woke up early again Monday morning - 4.30am EST, this not by design but stuffed up with a cold, it's hard to sleep well. Looked out the window - clear. Now or never this month for a moonless view so I don the arctic gear and, fortified by half a cup of tea, trudge over the frozen snow drifts to the observatory. Check the thermometer in the observatory before opening up : -22=B0C. The focusser on the 6" refractor is very stiff. Put the 55mm Plossl on with the Hendrick eyepiece heater ( otherwise everything is going to look like a comet).
This comet looks much brighter now than when I checked it out last week with binoculars from indoors. Looking at it somewhat defocussed - naked eye,no glasses- it looks only slightly dimmer than Deneb and brighter than gamma Cygni so the 1.5 estimates I have been hearing seem close. The structure of the nucleus shows much better with the telescope. The tail is quite broad, almost two distinct tails. I could trace it over the whole eyepiece field, stretching NW about 2=B0. The coma on the W side of the nucleus is much more prominent than on the NE side. Despite the temperature, this held my attention till dawn. This session reminds me of something I read about the hazards of 19th century astronomy- the major ones were : falling off the ladder and catching pneumonia. The 20th century added another one - getting arrested!
Peter 44=B0N 80=B035'W
From: George Zay GeoZay@aol.com
Date: Mon, Fri, 14 Feb 1997 11:55:20 -0500 (EST)
Subject: Hale/Bopp Observation Feb 14 ZAYGE
I had the pleasure of observing Hale/Bopp again this morning after a few hours of meteor plotting. It was very windy all night...but the skies were clear and dark...Sky Limiting Magnitude of 6.0. I spent most of my comet time trying to make photographs...To which I made two exposures...A 15 minute exposure and a 27 minute exposure with my 4"SCT at f/5. Again using T-Max 400 and developed in T-max developer. I used a telecompressor so it was at f/5. Afterwards I viewed the comet with my 10" SCT and it looked lovely...very delicate looking. Anyhow, There is a very active looking jet to the south still. In my 14X100 binoculars I noticed about a 2.5 degree dust tail. With my 7X50 binoculars I was able to barely make out about a 7 degree ion tail. I made a quick estimate of the comets coma and nucleus combined magnitude and came out with 1.5 or 1.6 ...same as two nights ago. When I got home I was so anxious about whether my photographs came out or not... I developed them right away. I was very much pleased to see two decent negatives...hopefully I will make a couple prints later this afternoon...after some shut eye that is...and give the negatives some time to dry. On the negatives, the 27 minute exposure was the best...stars still pinpoint. The tail quiet obvious....definitely looks a lot better than the one I was pleased with a couple days ago. On the negative, the 4 degree field shows a tail all the way across and disappeared at the negatives edge. At that point it was quiet thin...but still obvious.
George Zay
Anthony Parra aparra1@pie.xtec.es
February 10, 1997 .
This time I was lucky!
I awake every morning at 6:00, with just enough time to glance the dawn sky before going to work. Dressed as a skier, I climb to the roof, carrying the small Celestron and a tripod. It's slightly foggy and the light pollution is terrible, as usual. All I can see when looking to the east is the summer triangle, Altair being almost invisible. Comet Hale-Bopp is where it should be, but its aspect is far from the glorious descriptions lucky people living under dark skies report. I'm only able to discern the nucleus and the brightest 4 minutes of coma around it. Oh, my God! How I would like to be in a place where I could see the wonders of the sky!
Suddenly, a bolide as bright as the cursed mercury-vapor street lamps crosses slowly the sky from near Deneb down to the horizon: about 10 degrees in 2 seconds. One of the brightest I've ever seen: white, with a brilliant green front part and a short quickly vanishing 'tail'. That's right: without sonic boom, because everybody is sleeping now.
Incidentally, the local news published six days ago a report about a big bolide following a low-angle trajectory that exploded with a loud bang over the Montseny mountains, not far from Barcelona. It broke up into several smaller pieces than could be seen tens of km farther to the south. I'm looking for more information about this event.
Tony
From my roof 'observatory' at l'Hospitalet del Llobregat (Spain).
From: Mark Wagner mgw@RESOURCE-INTL.COM
Date: Sun, 9 Feb 1997 14:51:09 -0800 (PST)
Subject: Photon Feast with dessert!
(excerpts)
Yesterday, the San Francisco bay area had a one day break from the cloudy/rainy winter we have been having. It was a thoroughly inexplicable occurance, since this was a nearly moonless Saturday. So, after the usual morning family obligations, I began fielding phone calls from astro-friends wondering who was going to Fremont Peak. Everyone had a bad case of photon-deprivation were ready to rumble on down...
Leaving the south bay, the drive is short... 37/10000ths of a light second and you're at the Peak. You're there in a flash. What a great trade... that quick drive to see objects 50 million light years away... plus some spectacular "object du jour" that were unique and unexpected...
Arriving at "The Peak" at 3:30pm, I found the observing area nearly full. Huh? Is this mid-summer or early February? What's the deal with the crowd? Ah... yes.... the lure of clear skies... enough to make any California astronomer brave the near freezing night temperatures!
I set up the 14.5" dob and began admiring the variety of equipment. Want to check out a wide array of astronomy gear? The Peak is da'place. 20" homebuilt dob, 18" Obsession, 18" Sky Design, 17" homebuilt dob, 12.5" Orion dob, 8" Meade SCT, 8" Meade LX 200, 12" Meade LX 200, 18" JMI NGT, 6" Cave Newtonian, 7" Questar (loaded), 4" Takahashi, 6" Astrophysics, 5" Astrophysics, Astrophysics Traveller... many, many others... and ... oh... the 30" Challenger reflector in the Fremont Peak Observatory.
(...)
Now fatigue was beginning to take over. I walked aimlessly around for a while... looking to the east for the bright traveller to appear. I had not seen the comet since last fall when it was in Scutum. Would it really be *that* much bigger and brighter?
Suddenly, a disembodied voice in the dark called me to some 16 x 70 tripod mounted binoculars. OH MY GOD
What a coma. Was that a plume off the side of the nucleus? It must be. Look how big and bright it is. Is it another Hyakutake? No way. No, it is different, magnificent in its own right. This comet was not the "beauty queen" we saw a year ago March, this comet was, instead, specatular for its sheer size and activity. I had to see it through a telescope!
I walked over to the 6" AstroPhysics. Well, the nucleus had an active geyser spouting 90 degrees away from the tail. In the fountain was, well, clouds. And, material was not just coming off in the plume, but all around the nucleus. the coma itself was quite a sight... think of how the Ring Nebula is illuminated brightly at the edges of the "bubble" but not in the center. That is how HB's coma appeared to me. Like a distended upside down "U" with the area behind the nucleus being (to me) clear in appearance. The coma was bright along the edges, and the side with the brilliant fountain had a brighter coma.
And to think this is going to become brighter and larger....
I went up to the observatory and had a look through the 30". The fountain had the appearance of clouds as it seemed to have come off the nucleus in waves or bands. This one will be a DON'T MISS IT show in a month.
(...)
I drove relaxedly down the hill, past the horses with their winter coats, past the cows having breakfast, past the sheep and past the rushing stream following San Juan Canyon Road... back toward "civilization" a mere 37/10000ths of a light year away...
From: JOHN LEPPERT denebobs@utma.com
Date: Sat, 08 Feb 1997 09:54:24 -0800
Subject: Hale-Bopp observation report - January 08
From today's journal entry, the 20th observation since December 26 when Comet Hale-Bopp was recovered in the pre-dawn sky:
FEBRUARY 08. After having slept at the observatory the previous two nights and than only getting fleeting glimpses of the comet, I elected to sleep overnight at the house since I figured my chances of seeing it this morning were poor, given last night's overcast skies. I awoke with a start at 4 o'clock, leapt out of bed and parted the bedroom curtains fully expecting to see nothing. Behold clear skies! Thought, must be damp and a bit windy --- ice crystals reflecting off yard light a mile south. After hastily dressing, I walked out into the pleasant 12Fo morning reaching the observatory a quarter past the hour; what a sight --- bright coma just to the lower left of gamma Sagittae --- 2-3o tail conspicuous. Thinking, I'm not gonna waste time diddling with cameras this morning, let's just spend a couple hours at the telescope and enjoy the view. After first using the binoculars, I uncovered the 8-inch SCT, aligned the NGC-MAX on Vega so I could get coordinate fixes for the comet, and then moved the telescope down towards the northeastern horizon. Glancing only briefly in the 9x60 finderscope, I quickly inserted a 2-inch 40 mm SW ocular into the diagonal, than stepped back, and took a quick glance again towards the comet while thinking the 2o field (32x) ought to be pretty wonderful. Turning back, I took a deep breath, shifted my head to the left, and slowly descended my right eye to the eyepiece. I thought --- God, what I've been missing the last 6 weeks using the old 4-inch Dynascope... the detail...what a magnificent comet...this is without a doubt as fine as Hyakutake, even lacking that wonderful segmented tail...if only my friends could see Hale-Bopp here, or at the very least at a site as dark as this --- such were my thoughts. I than inserted a 2-inch 14 mm UW ocular for a closer view at 91x, noting bright 3.5 magnitude gamma Sge at the edge of the 0.9o field looking dim by comparison to the brilliant elongated nucleus sporting jets, encircled by a well defined hood-like coma, while steams of matter flowed off in a shapely gossamer-like tail. It's show time! An observing log follows:
CST Comet Hale-Bopp field stars comments / other object(s)
Alt Az mag PAo sep Alt Az
- -----------------------------------------------------------------------
04:15 4.0o 64.7o sighted naked eye
04:25 5.5o 66.6o 8x56 binoculars
04:55 10.2o 72.1o 40 mm ocular (32x & 2.09o field)
05:13 13.0o 75.2o 14 mm ocular (91x & 0.92o field)
05:50 19.0o 81.9o 14 mm ocular - made field drawing
elongated nucleus PA 135o-315o
tail PA 40o
20hr0.4min RA +19o23' DEC
3.5 50 0o23' gamma Sge
7.7 25 0o31' within the tail
8.7 130 0o04'
8.8 220 0o04'
8.8 350 0o22'
9.2 330 0o13'
9.2 45 0o25' within the tail
9.3 95 0o29'
06:45 28.3o 92.3o last sighted through cloud
John Leppert
Deneb Observatory 48o 56' 07"N 99o 09' 40" W
From: palmer@sfu.ca (Leigh Palmer)
Date: Tue, 4 Feb 1997 06:53:12 +0800
Subject: Hale-Bopp on a frosty morning
I awoke this morning at my usual 5:40 and took my customary morning shower. I live beside an 85-acre lake here in Burnaby, British Columbia (49.3 degrees N latitude). Most winter mornings it is either cloudy or clear but foggy. This morning is an exception. It is clear and transparent, so I grabbed my trusty 20x60s (tripod mounted) and headed out into the park to see if I could find the comet. I had not yet seen it (I'm an astronomer?) and I'd read that it is now a naked eye object. Needless to say to those of you who have seen it, I didn't need my glasses to find it. It is lovely! Wouldn't it be nice to just freeze it there in its spot between Altair and Albireo in the summer triangle? From my place at six am the tail (it hardly deserves the name, being as fat as it is) points straight toward the zenith, and since it stands more than twenty degrees above the horizon I can see it from my own yard over my housetop. I needn't go into the park at all. I did have a look at it through the binocs. The nucleus seems to be spread a bit in the horizontal direction. I discerned no discrete streamers, just a very fat, luminous coma that tailed off somewhere above the top of my field of view with the comet centered. I didn't spend all my time looking at the comet. Mars is around, I see, and the crescent Moon is gorgeous this morning. Antares is blazing away, and I can make out five stars in Corona Borealis. I was too lazy to put the binocs on it to see if T CBr had somehow erupted. That is difficult with objects high in the sky.
I've got to get to work (I write in the mornings). Just had to share this, however. We're going to enjoy this comet!
Leigh
From: George Zay GeoZay@aol.com
Date: Mon, 3 Feb 1997 12:23:24 -0500 (EST)
Subject: Hale/Bopp Observation Feb 3 ZAYGE
Observing from my Descanso observatory under clear, but windy skies and a Limiting magnitude of 6.0, the comet looked superb. Looking thru 14X100 binoculars, I was able to see a 2 degree tail. As for estimated magnitude, I used both Epsilon Cygni and Gamma Cygni as reference stars. After condensing the coma and tail, I give Hale/Bopp a magnitude range of 2.0 - 2.2. I can see part of the tail with the naked eye. Thru the binoculars, the view was the best I've seen of this comet yet. It appeared better looking to me than Hyakutake did when it was just sporting a 2 degree tail. The tail now has a graceful soft look. It reminds me of a boulder in a river as both sides of the coma swept back it's tail and rejoined with a noticeable gap directly behind the coma.
George Zay
Descanso, Calif.
Long: 116 deg 37' West Lat: 32 deg 50' North