Tag Archives: comets

Searching for Comet C/2024 G3 (Atlas)

Posted on by March 30, 2025
2025.01.19 

Comet C/2024 G3 (Atlas)Just when I thought another evening with no success, the comet suddenly appeared at 8:50pm (sast). By then I was almost a lonely soul sitting on a bench on the promenade, under floodlights.

A couple passed by and asked, like so many others earlier: “Is it safe to be sitting here with all this gear?” Well I suppose no, but how else will I manage to take photos of a comet that will only maybe come around again in hundreds of thousands of years?

I did a short star hopping gig just to keep them hanging with me.

They went there way… I watched and checked over my shoulder to see whether my car was still there.

A young girl came along with her parents. Relieved I shouted: “Look – a comet! and Venus and Saturn and Jupiter and Mars” In return for the free session on planets, they kept me company.

The girl said – “hey, I think I’ve seen you before at the Afrikaans Language Monument!” What a small world. They did not realise that the very next Friday, the 24 Jan 2025, the Orion Observasie Group would be back at the monument for another stargazing picnic.

It’s a small world but what a vast universe.

Indoors Astronomy Stargazing Outreach

Posted on by March 30, 2025
Comet C/2024 G3 (Atlas) Strand, South Africa. 2025.01.21
This was my very first indoors astronomy stargazing outreach!
Despite howling winds, obscured western horizon, severe light pollution, window panes in need of cleaning, I managed to show the comet with binoculars. Of course camera live view made things a bit easier.
I cannot emphasise enough how faint this comet is. Luckily I told my audience in advance that what they are seeing on the internet and even on this image is not what we will be seeing in real live conditions. Don’t go rushing to the optometrist
I could spot the comet naked eye but if you do not know where to look you will miss it!
I’ll have to do a bit of window cleaning before tonight.
(The bright star above the comet is the bright star Achernar)

The Ghost of Comet Faye

Posted on by January 15, 2020

2018.05.03
I was up at the crack of dawn and through my window I noticed Jupiter, brilliant and bright after the rain and presenting a perfect photo opportunity. Through my camera lens I could see three of Jupiter’s moons lined up to one side of the planet. After downloading the images to my computer, I was thrilled that the fourth moon, Ganymede, showed up in the glow of the planet as well, but that was not all that became visible. There was a definite faint greenish object in all of my images. Lens flare/ ghosting came to mind but it just seemed different. The object was somewhat elongated.

I was imaging in the constellation of Libra. Could there be, had I found, what in heaven’s name was this strange object in my images? It was then that I read all about Comet 4P/Faye sailing through Libra ( May 2018), plotted on charts almost precisely at the location of the object in my images!

Did I stop to ask myself whether it would have been possible to capture a +22 mag comet with my camera? No!
Did I think that maybe the object was moving too fast in 10 min intervals to be a comet? No! I had read that 4P/Faye was a mover.

The scales tipped, I almost jumped out of my skin, I had imaged another comet! Nothing close to my previous Mc Naught, Lovejoy or PanStarrs but a very dim one this time, even dimmer than Comet C2012 F6 (Lemmon) which I imaged in 2013.

The comet sage in Libra still weighs heavily on my shoulders. If it were not for Slooh members, who are regular comet hunters, my image could have gone down in history as a hoax. They pointed out that comet 4P/Faye was far too dim – even for the Slooh telescopes.

But there was something there which I could not ignore and so I’ll always remember that morning when the Ghost of Comet Faye paid a visit in Libra….

Footnote: Do not try +22magnitude objects at home!