Comet McNaught in Half Moon from Snake Valley

[ballaratdragons]

Friday 26 January

Eric (Erick) rang and said he was coming up to the SVAA club site again tonight, this time to hopefully see the Comet in our dark (Moonlit!!!) sky.

The forecast was for showers, but some websites said clear skies. :shrug:

The sky here has been absolutely clear all day, so things looked hopeful. Eric arrived around 9pm to a sky quickly clouding over. Within 10 minutes it was total cloud cover. We even had one bit of lightning and thunder!!! :eyepop:
Then, we spotted a small patch of clear on the horizon blowing towards us (it was very windy).

We waited and waited, but that one sucker hole went to the west of the comet and exposed a bright half Moon! :mad2:

"Patience lads" we told ourselves and left everything set up exactly where it was. I know what the weather up here can do, raining one minute, glass the next.

Yep, it happened that way. The clouds rolled away exposing a fantastic view of Comet McNaught with its tail reaching and arching way up into the darkening sky. Although not as good as previous nights, Eric was excited to see it so clearly. Even with a Half Moon it was a spectacle to behold!!!!
Naked eye it was spectacular.
After investigating it thru 20x80's, 30x100's and the 12" Dob, we moved on to other objects (occasionally returning to the comet). The Transparency went from 0/10 to 8/10, and the seeing was a magnificent 9/10. No matter how much I bumped up the mag, everything was beautiful, except Saturn, but it was down in the muck on the horizon.

It was great to walk around the 3 different methods of viewing and compare the FOV of each. We circled from the 30x100's to the 12" to the 20x80's round and round on each object :lol:
All looked fantastic in different ways: Tarantula, Orion Neb, Trap, Jewel Box, Humunculus, Keyhole, 47Tuc etc etc.
Even with the Half Moon washing the sky out, LMC, SMC and Carina neb all stuck out like the proverbial, naked eye!

11:30pm and the clouds returned, this time with their forecast showers. Inside the Clubroom for a coffee and talk about the terrific night we had.

The Comets tail still looked long (15+ degrees) and bright and the Moon isn't spoiling it for us up here.
All up, a great night :thumbsup:

[astro_nutt]

That's great Ken..it's not often that the weather starts rotten then clears up..which means someone may have brougth a new scope with them but didn't set it up!!..only kidding!..wish I was there though!
Cheers!

[ballaratdragons]

Once this Moon racks off, come on up :thumbsup:
I'm suprised at how bright and long the tail was with the amount of Moon in the sky. Simply amazing! We could see right up to where it starts breaking into the seperate fan sections.

[RB]

That's great Ken, I'm glad it cleared and you guys had a great session.
I was surprised tonight too, even though the comet is dimmer, it's still a magnificent sight, even with the moon and in the full glare of light polluted Gosford where I was imaging this evening with Mike(Ice).

[ballaratdragons]

Somehow Andrew, I think even the Full Moon isn't gonna wash this spectacle out!

As it fights against the Moonlight it is getting higher in the sky at the same time, taking it into even darker observing times. :thumbsup:

[mojo]

John (Phobos) and I went up there last night. Well, I think it was 30Km's out of Ballarat. Somewhere near a Lavender farm? The skies really were magnificent.

[ballaratdragons]

Terry, sounds like the Yuulong Lavendar Farm over in Mt. Edgerton.

That's about 30k on the Melbourne side of Ballarat. We are about 30+k on the other side of Ballarat.

Luckily from Mt.Edgerton you would've completely missed the light from Ballarat if you were comet watching, coz Ballarat is North West from there and you would've been looking South west.

[mojo]

That's it! Mt. Edgerton. Thanks Ken.
Just barely saw the light from Melbourne but if there was light from Ballarat, we couldn't see it anyway because of the moon. But we figured we were far enough away from the major city lights when we were aimlessly driving the back roads.

Set up on a dead-end gravel road between two cow paddocks which is owned by a lovely lady who's family has owned the gazillion acres since 1884. Country folk like a chat with complete strangers setting up camera's and telescopes out the back paddock :)

[ballaratdragons]

Ummmm . . . yep! :thumbsup: Too right we do. :thumbsup:

[iceman]

Nice report Ken, it sure is still a great sight.

[erick]

It's taken all day before I could get near the computer to comment. Great night, many thanks to Ken. First time I saw Comet McNaught in dark skies. Way better than viewing over Melbourne. Saw so much more of the tail, not only length, but breadth. I'd seen the spread of the tail to the right of the nucleus in photos, but not in the sky. Now I've seen it. Wow! As Ken said, too much moonlight to see the filamentary striae. That's OK, maybe later in this lunar cycle?

We got about 45 min of cloud-free sky. It was amazing. The clouds suddenly blew away and unveiled the Comet like curtains opening on a stage. The wind then died to bearable and we had that short interval until the wind and clouds returned and it started to rain as we packed up. In fact, the clouds closed on the nucleus like curtains at the end of the performance!

I couldn't really tear myself away from the Comet, but the sky was magnificent. Though we are in bright moonshine, LMC, SMC, 47Tuc were no trouble to view naked eye!

And Ken shared his 12" Dob with me. OK, I have to admit it - I cannot remember the last time I looked through any telescope, let alone a 12" reflector! Actually, I had a few seconds through astro_nutt's 10" Dob one unsuccessful comet hunting night last week. From Snake Valley last night:- the Moon, Jewel Box, Orion Neb, 47Tuc, Tarantula Neb, Eta Carina, Saturn - what a feast for an observing virgin like me! And all squeezed into the order of tens of minutes.

It was a fun day - I observed the Comet just after its rise at 5:30am in Melbourne, then again before its set at 9:45pm, 180km away. And I had to be somewhere at 8:30 this morning - am I tired!

This is fun! Crazy but fun!! Eric :)

[danielsun]

Great report guys! I'm looking forward to getting back up to snake valley as soon as i can.