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Rapidly sinking
into the Eastern morning twilight, this comet was about the lowest
I can truly go from the back yard observatory here in Payson.
At 5:30am, which is less than half an hour before morning twilight
this time of year, I could only get half the telescopes aperture
over the wall of the observatory. Sheets of ice were forming
on everything, and it was 16F outside, the first clear morning
in weeks after a mountain of rain and snow had fallen. Sheets
of ice were forming very rapidly on the entire telescope and
CCD cameras, and even the underside of the metal roof was frozen
solid.
Here is a short
color exposure, from many that were simply unusable from the
seeing conditions that low on the horizon. The comets head is
the round green area in the lower part of this frame, while the
long dust tail flows off the top of the frame.
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Lens: 12.5" f/5 Home bult Newtonian
Platform: Astrophysics AP1200
Exposure: 3m RGB
Location: Payson, Arizona
Elevation: 5150 ft.
Sky: Seeing 2/10, Transparency 2/10
Outside Temperature: 16F
Processing Tools: Maxim DL, Photoshop CS2
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