Viewing Comet Tsuchinshan-ATLAS when it enters the evening sky
Link here. For those living in the northern hemisphere, Comet Tsuchinshan-ATLAS will be bright and visible to the naked eye just after sunset beginning tomorrow.
“As soon as October 11th, ambitious comet spotters may pick up the comet during twilight just above the western horizon,” says Sky & Telescope Contributing Editor Bob King. “Binoculars will help you see the comet throughout its appearance.”
About 40 minutes after sunset on Friday, find a spot with a good view down to the western horizon. The first thing that will catch your eye will be the bright planet Venus, the Evening Star — that’s your starting point. Hold your fist out at arm’s length; the comet is about 2½ fists to Venus’s right. The comet will still look tiny in Friday’s twilight — like a hazy star with a small tail — and will set while twilight is still in progress.
Comet Tsuchinshan-ATLAS (pronounced choo-cheen-SHAHN) will remain visible for the next ten days, with the best viewing likely from October 13th to October 16th.
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Link here. For those living in the northern hemisphere, Comet Tsuchinshan-ATLAS will be bright and visible to the naked eye just after sunset beginning tomorrow.
“As soon as October 11th, ambitious comet spotters may pick up the comet during twilight just above the western horizon,” says Sky & Telescope Contributing Editor Bob King. “Binoculars will help you see the comet throughout its appearance.”
About 40 minutes after sunset on Friday, find a spot with a good view down to the western horizon. The first thing that will catch your eye will be the bright planet Venus, the Evening Star — that’s your starting point. Hold your fist out at arm’s length; the comet is about 2½ fists to Venus’s right. The comet will still look tiny in Friday’s twilight — like a hazy star with a small tail — and will set while twilight is still in progress.
Comet Tsuchinshan-ATLAS (pronounced choo-cheen-SHAHN) will remain visible for the next ten days, with the best viewing likely from October 13th to October 16th.
Readers!
Please consider supporting my work here at Behind the Black. Your support allows me the freedom and ability to analyze objectively the ongoing renaissance in space, as well as the cultural changes -- for good or ill -- that are happening across America. Fourteen years ago I wrote that SLS and Orion were a bad ideas, a waste of money, would be years behind schedule, and better replaced by commercial private enterprise. Only now does it appear that Washington might finally recognize this reality.
In 2020 when the world panicked over COVID I wrote that the panic was unnecessary, that the virus was apparently simply a variation of the flu, that masks were not simply pointless but if worn incorrectly were a health threat, that the lockdowns were a disaster and did nothing to stop the spread of COVID. Only in the past year have some of our so-called experts in the health field have begun to recognize these facts.
Your help allows me to do this kind of intelligent analysis. I take no advertising or sponsors, so my reporting isn't influenced by donations by established space or drug companies. Instead, I rely entirely on donations and subscriptions from my readers, which gives me the freedom to write what I think, unencumbered by outside influences.
You can support me either by giving a one-time contribution or a regular subscription. There are four ways of doing so:
1. Zelle: This is the only internet method that charges no fees. All you have to do is use the Zelle link at your internet bank and give my name and email address (zimmerman at nasw dot org). What you donate is what I get.
2. Patreon: Go to my website there and pick one of five monthly subscription amounts, or by making a one-time donation.
3. A Paypal Donation or subscription:
4. Donate by check, payable to Robert Zimmerman and mailed to
Behind The Black
c/o Robert Zimmerman
P.O.Box 1262
Cortaro, AZ 85652
You can also support me by buying one of my books, as noted in the boxes interspersed throughout the webpage or shown in the menu above.
“Hold your fist out at arm’s length; the comet is about 2½ fists to Venus’s right.”
This is an interesting way to describe the location. “. . . to Venus’s right.”
Since we do not know if Venus is “facing” us or “facing” away, we cannot know if we should look to the right or left of the planet as WE see it.
Haven’t heard any more about an FAA flight license. I wonder if all the hopes will be dashed, or whether there will be a last minute issuance on Friday.
Of course I was always of two minds about why so many licenses were issued at the very last moment: was it to flex the regulatory muscles and let Elon know who was boss, or was it to prevent an environmental stay from a sympathetic judge?
Or, it just occurs to me, was it perhaps both?!
Americans will do anything to avoid using the metric system or azimuth and elevation.
“To the right of Venus”. At least that’s where I’ll start looking.
Linked article: As twilight fades on Monday, October 14th, it will be two fists to the upper right of Venus (if seen from the northern U.S.) or to the right of Venus (if seen from the southern U.S.). As twilight turns to night, the comet will remain in view, its long, straight tail pointing up from the horizon.
Hope it’s big and bright!
And harbingers doom.
John observed:
“Americans will do anything to avoid using the metric system or azimuth and elevation.”
Imagine, if you will, a world in which the vasty great majority of people, could not tell you what ‘azimuth’ was, if a year’s salary were at stake. Much seems to have been made recently about the American propensity to describe weights and measures in terms of familiar objects. That’s not stupid, it’s practical.
If I say something is ‘refrigerator-size’, anyone who has seen a domestic reefer immediately grasps the concept. If I say the object is 2m high, 1m square, and weighs 150kg, you may well grasp it, but you have to process the information for a split-second. And, a lot more verbiage to describe the same concept.
Finally got to see it tonight! You can see it with the naked eyes, but I did bring some binoculars for the wife.