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Comet Mach wood as Weihnachtskomet
by Hans Zekl
for astronews.com
20 December 2004

The Biblical Weihnachtsgeschichte is often brought with a comet in connection, which in the new will as star of Bethlehem one describes. This interpretation is wrong, but it is gladly used nevertheless in many illustrations. But this year will be to see to Christmas actually a comet in the night sky.
Position of the comet Mach wood

S@h Berkeley's Staff Friends Club m7 ©

Thanks Sir UllI!

Timmy

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Information for observing the Machholz comet in the Northern Hemisphere or the Southern Hemisphere.

There is also interesting information about recent magnitudes of this comet.

The predicted maximum magnitude was originally 4 but it looks like it will grows to a little bit higher then that.

Getting brighter

Discovered on Aug. 27 by veteran comet hunter Donald E. Machholz of Colfax, California, comet Machholz (C/2004 Q2) has been brightening steadily during the past several months while approaching both the Sun and Earth.

This comet currently is glowing at around magnitude 3.5 and is visible to the naked eye in dark, non-light polluted skies, though much better seen in binoculars or telescopes. This kind of brightness makes Machholz a very fine comet from the viewpoint of a serious amateur astronomer, but it doesn’t appear that this comet will become the kind of spectacle that Comet Hale-Bopp was in grabbing the broader public’s attention.

On the evening of Jan. 7, it will conveniently pass just a couple of degrees to the west of the famous Pleiades star cluster, making for a pretty sight in binoculars. The comet will probably be cresting at its brightest right around this time, perhaps peaking at around magnitude +3.3, which would make it equal in brightness to Megrez, the star that joins the handle with the bowl of the Big Dipper.

Read the full story here.

Magnitude graph is here.

On Friday night, January 7th, Comet Machholz visits the Pleiades.

January 5, 2005: A cloud of gas bigger than the planet Jupiter, glowing alien green, is about to sweep past the Seven Sisters in Taurus. Got binoculars? You can watch it happen.

Step outside on Friday night, January 7th, between 9 and 10 o'clock, and face south. There's Orion the Hunter locked in combat with Taurus the Bull. The star patterns are unmistakable. Just above them hovers a delicate little dipper--the Seven Sisters, a.k.a. the Pleiades. [sky map]

This is how the sky looks almost any evening in January. Except on January 7th there's something extra: the green cloud.

Look 2o to the right of the Pleiades. (If you live in the southern hemisphere, look to the left.) The tip of your pinky finger, held at arms length is about 1o wide, so 2o is two pinkies. The cloud resembles a faint and fuzzy star, barely visible to the unaided eye, but easy to see through binoculars.

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Green Comet

Greetings from Germany NRW
Ulli S@h Berkeley's Staff Friends Club m7 ©