Comet Lulin visible under worst condition
I carried my 11x70 to the top of our dormitory at around 14:50 UT. The sky condition has improved significantly compare to that of the morning (overcast), but it's still mostly cloudy, with a few bright stars occasionary visible in the cloud gaps, I estimated the LM to be around +1.0 at that moment, one of the worst observing nights I have ever experienced. However I still manage to spot the comet. At around 15:05 UT, a clear region was passing over the Lulin region, so I point my binocular to the southeast direction of Saturn. I move the observing field a little bit and feel that there is a small "cloud" near a curve lined by four stars. A very clear gap was just passing the region and I was able to confirm its existances. A 7.46 mag. star coded TYC 267-888-1 was also visible at those seconds, so I estimated the surface brightness of the comet to be around 7.5 mag, with a diameter up to around 20'. The cloud came again after less than half a minute and was increasing again, after waiting for five minutes I packed my binocular and went downstairs.
I'm very pleased to find the comet is such a bad condition, but I think experiences are required under such a condition. Also I need to point out that the brightness estimation is far from reliable since the sky condition is far from satisfying.
I should have wait for more time but today I'm very tired. I think I must go to bed now or I may catch a cold. Good luck to you all!
Update: I just receive a fresh image from Lulin Observatory, taken by the Lulin 10-cm f/8 refractor with U9000 CCD last night (300s x 5 combined). The comet looks really gorgeous! Note its newly-developed beautiful dust tail! After earning their permission to publicaze the image on my blog, I'm showing it here. Well, I just bound up my hair for a few hours last night and the comet soon made a response? (the comet looks very different now comparing the images prior to Feb. 22, you may browse spaceweather.com for a comparasion) Bravo, fantastic. I'll depart soon for Gaocun Village, a remote site about 150 kilometers from Guangzhou which is one of the bases of our Guangdong Southern Cross Star Association, for a good view of the comet. Stay tuned for updates.
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本文发表于2009 February 24 0:14,归类为English Island, 观星手记。您可以通过RSS 2.0来订阅有关的评论。 您也可以留下评论或在您自己的站点跟踪引用。 This entry was posted on 2009 February 24 at 0:14 and filed under English Island, 观星手记. Follow any responses to this post through RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback from your own site. |
约4年前 about 4 years ago
hello...
I am in Guangzhou...I am expecting Lulin, but I only have my eyes to watch it(No telescope)...Did you see it? any photos? I will still wait tonight and hope some luck to come:)
约4年前 about 4 years ago
啊呀,大家都是中国人嘛,就不必用鸟文啦。彗星现在很容易看到,但如果在市区的话还是需要一架小双筒和多一点点的经验
约4年前 about 4 years ago
It's sad that i knew the Luling comet coming just now..Umm,btw, i think you r a cool guy, and i appreciate some of your opinion to lots of things. I'm a student studying physics,07级,maybe can meet you someday in some place in the future~
约4年前 about 4 years ago
谢谢夸奖。没关系,你高兴的话这些天都可以看到的,特别是—— 呃呀,说了07级,那是不是就是师弟呢?珠海的条件还是不错的说,吼吼!
约4年前 about 4 years ago
不畏浮云遮望眼啊~
约4年前 about 4 years ago
要有这种“不畏浮云遮望眼”的精神~
约4年前 about 4 years ago
My god...
约4年前 about 4 years ago
这未免也太太简短了吧……
约4年前 about 4 years ago
I live in Pennsylvania, in the United States, 50 miles north of Philadelphia. I've just returned from a local lake which affords a fairly dark sky and I'm happy to report that Lulin was visible with a pair of Nikon 7x50 binoculars. It was very hard to detect a nucleus and only by averting my eyes and not looking directly at the comet was I able to detect the tails. I also tried using a Fuji 60x80 spotting scope but was disappointed with the results, only being able to use one eye. Going back to the binoculars it was obviously green; but again not much, if any of a nucleus. In the 1990's I also spotted a comet in the sky (hyakutake) and thought I must be making a discovery having heard nothing about it in the news. On it's return trip from going around the sun it was highly publicised, and I took many photos of it. It was a great year for comets; later in the year I took many photos of Hale-Bopp as well. Now that most everyone uses digital, I'm afraid I'm un-prepared to take photos of Lulin, not even knowing where my 35mm camera is! Thanks for making such a fun discovery. By the way, the 60x80 scope did pick up the rings of Saturn quite well ;>
约4年前 about 4 years ago
Thanks, I hope you enjoy observing Lulin. I didn't take photo of Lulin myself but I greatly enjoy the visual observing time, that's the most beautiful comet I have ever seen I think. There are lots of people have taken nice digital photo of it and I enjoy them, too.
约4年前 about 4 years ago
哈哈~~终于很“吃力”地看完了小龙的文章...
很佩服你这种执着的精神丫。
不过可惜的是HZ一直到3月中旬都是雨天...看来LM暂时要和我们告别一段时间了~~
看了你们南十字聚会的照片~~好羡慕的!盼望着有一天能够去广州和大家一起聚会、活动!^-^
约4年前 about 4 years ago
随时来呀,我随时欢迎~~~ 最好下个月就作为领队来吧,我招待哈!~
约4年前 about 4 years ago
我们这里(河南开封)天气不是很好..希望赶快好起来,好看看这颗彗星...叶兄,再次祝贺你!
约4年前 about 4 years ago
谢谢啦,看不看得到还是要看RP啊……
约4年前 about 4 years ago
继续简短一下~Congratulations!
约4年前 about 4 years ago
被彗尾雷到了,无语了……所以简短。无声胜有声。
PS:07物理?理论副部就是07物理的,不会认识吧……
约4年前 about 4 years ago
果然和你的头发很像吧!吼吼~
约4年前 about 4 years ago
Hello!
Very Interesting post! Thank you for such interesting resource!
PS: Sorry for my bad english, I'v just started to learn this language
See you!
Your, Raiul Baztepo
约4年前 about 4 years ago
Hi Raiul, your meaning is clear to me, keep up the good work!