Comments on: ‘Comets of the Centuries’ . . .

By: SteveS

SteveS — Sat, 28 Dec 2013 14:17:33 +0000

Now that would be a sight. I can wait 16 years or so, but to the end of this century or into the next…

Interesting that the comets of the century were discovered and observed in the last quarter of a year.

By: ER

ER — Sat, 28 Dec 2013 02:06:07 +0000

Unfortunately, they are often best viewed from the opposite hemisphere from the one in which you live, or are clouded out. It doesn’t help that about half of them put on their best show right around sunrise, so unless you get up that early, you aren’t likely to see it. I’ve seen several telescopically, but I saw one in the mid ’90s (I can’t recall whether it was Hale-Bopp or Hyakutake) that was actually quite spectacular.

I set the alarm for an hour before sunrise and set up my scope to take some pictures of it, and early risers on their way to work at my apartment complex came by and asked me what I was looking at. When I pointed it out, low on the horizon, brighter than first magnitude, and with a mother-of-pearl tail stretching across 3 degrees of dawn sky (six full moons), they freaked out.

I can see why in the olden days, when people were quite familiar with celestial phenomena and there was no light pollution, they caused fear and panic. Comets show up from nowhere, very mysteriously. Farmers trudging to the fields around sunrise would watch this gleaming scimitar of light rising just ahead of the sun, without any warning. And it would be visible for several days, slowly moving across the familiar constellations. No wonder people were terrified of them.

I suspect none of my neighbors would have noticed it if I hadn’t been there to point it out. Most people don’t look at the sky any more, they just don’t care. To them, it always looks the same.

It was the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen in the sky, with the possible exception of the Southern Milky Way from a ship at sea.

By: FrankC

FrankC — Fri, 27 Dec 2013 21:53:23 +0000

No doubt spectacular when viewed with a telescope.

My Dad went on and on with stories passed down about the Halley’s comet passing before he was born. He didn’t live to see it’s non-event return.

I never saw the 1965 comet and never heard of it until now.

I did squint and see Kohoutek, (or maybe it was Levy), and I was underwhelmed.

When they describe comets as brighter than the moon it is meaningless. Some stars are brighter than the moon but much smaller. Size matters.

Some of the ancient comets may have been spectacular but back in the day, the sky was about the most interesting thing to watch. I’ll admit I would be impressed by a comet easily visible in daylight by the naked eye. I can picture it in my minds eye and it would be neat.

Astronomers get excited about comets because they will be viewing them with a telescope. They try to share their excitement with the public by exaggerating visibility and misleading us with meaningless statistics. Scientists do this a lot.