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Thanks. I got out last night too. Went west of town to avoid city-glow, but the Moon was in full force. Here’s a few shots I took, although they aren’t as good as previous nights. I do like the one over farmland for its composition. It’s tricky to align land, comet and stars in one photo. All three are out of registration and that means I have to select each of those constituents independently, align them, and bring them back together. It has been an interesting process.
The comet was barely visible last night. I was wondering if it had faded that much or was it this thing’s fault?
This was a few shots, a couple exposed for the Moon and a couple exposed for the silhouetted land.
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Tonight (10/23), viewing from dark skies in NE Wisconsin near Trego, comet C/2023 A3 is a naked eye object in the middle of Ophiuchus. The comet is glorious in binoculars. It is about 12 degrees below Rasalhague and 8 degrees or so above the two globular stars clusters M10 and M12. I estimate the tail at 8-10 degrees and it appears intact in spite of an article on Space today suggesting the comet’s head is breaking up.
Yesterday, Friday, October 25, I was briefly observing at the KR7 reservoir in the upper parking lot, which has a better view than the lower parking lot. Unfortunately, from here you can also see the light sources on the horizon and there is clear light pollution from the city. Still, it’s a good place to observe near the city. Clouds were chasing the sky. Comet C/2023 A3 was very visible in 10×50 binoculars and its tail was visible across the field of view. Close above the comet, the open cluster IC 4665 4m1, called the Summer Beehive, was clearly visible above the beta star Ophiuchi Cebalrai 2m9.
Observing last night from my observatory. The SW sky isn’t too light polluted and the comet was viewed and photographed from 8 to 9 pm. Was using my 6 inch 150P Quattro scope and ZWO183 MC camera and Sky Watcher HEQ5 Pro mount. Stacked six 5 second frames. The image below is a relative closeup of the comet when it was near star SAO 122368 in Ophiuchus.
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That gif file looks poorly up close. Below is a reduced PNG file instead.
Nice one, Bob.
I hope that sungrazer survives its trip around the Sun. If it does we’ll have another comet to focus on before the end of the year.
I think the very first opportunity to see C/2024 S1 (ATLAS) will come at 7:25 on the morning of October 29, when the comet will be at zero altitude on the Rochester horizon and the Sun will be about 3.5 degrees below the horizon. You might be able to see the tail rising, which should run diagonally to the right below Spica. Visibility will improve the next few days, but the brightness of the comet will fade.
Probably however, the comet will be consumed by the sun in its closest approach. https://spaceweather.com/. The latest SOHO image shows a small comet approaching the sun.
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Comet C/2023 A3 among the stars of Ophiuchus (R) this evening (10-27). Some stars are identified with their magnitude and SAO number or just their magnitude. Left part of the image is courtesy Stellarium.
Bob, article https://rochesterskies.org/comet-c-2023-a3-tsuchinshan-atlas/ is now updated with your beautiful pictures of the comet A3 from October 25 and October 27.
<p style=”text-align: left;”>C/2023 A3 looking nearly stellar in my cell phone shot through my grab and go setup on 2024-10-27 at 7:56pm from south on Canon Falls. Visually, I could see quite a bit of tail but the phone didn’t seem to pick it up.
</p>On the Sun you can see a large spot with the naked eye protected by eclipse glasses in the left part.
Another one of C/2023 A3! The star 74 Oph (SAO 123377) was used to locate the comet. The comet shines at around 5.0 magnitude.
Motion of C/2023 A3 over a 24 hr. period from 11-6 to 11-7 2024. The comet has moved about 1 degree further from the star 74 Oph’s (bright star at bottom of image) position and it’s brightness has attenuated about 0.14 magnitude.
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