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So far the comet has been disappointing, being just visible as a feeble smudge through 16 inch telescopes in early November but this will hopefully be the start of ISON’s glory days. At the beginning of November when the comet was between Virgo and Leo, it showed new activity, developing an ion tail and reaching Mag 8 (visible in the morning sky through larger binoculars) reaching Virgo by the middle of the month. On 11 November the comet crossed the orbit of Venus, and suddenly increased in brightness! In just over a day the comet’s apparent magnitude improved by two magnitudes. By 16 November, it was a faint but visible object in the pre-dawn south-eastern sky to the unaided eye. It was an even more fascinating sight for observers with telescopes. By the third week of November it may be easily seen in the eastern sky before dawn. We might just see the tail sticking up from beyond the horizon before the Sun comes up. Grab any chance you can to see it, as by the fourth week of November the comet will be so close to the Sun that it will be almost sunrise before its head clears the horizon, so viewing it at all at this time might be challenging.
Topic: Comet ison? (Read 3555 times)
