The 92nd Carnival of Space is at The Launch Pad– an appropriately named blog for that as I’ve ever heard.
Speaking of space, I went out last night with binoculars to take a peek at comet Lulin, but I could barely see it through a strip of thick cirrus spanning the sky right across the comet’s position. It’s cloudy again now, and the window of viewing opportunity on Lulin is narrowing: as the Moon waxes, it gets brighter, washing out the comet. Their positions on the sky are closing as well, so in about three days it’ll be over for casual comet watching for a week or so. So get out tonight if you can and take another look! I have links to maps in a previous post.
March 1st, 2009 at 4:55 pm
I tried to observe Lulin during its perigee and I couldn’t see a thing. I used Stellarium to tell me where to look, but I couldn’t catch it with either my binoculars or my scope. I think a combination of light pollution, poor transparency and lack of familiarity with the night sky prevented me from spotting it at all.
March 1st, 2009 at 5:08 pm
I was out last night in 10F temp and 10-20mph wind. I lasted about and hour and just couldn’t see it in my binoculars. I think I’m pretty good and using star maps. It was frustrating. It was fairly dark at the location I was at. Oh well. Maybe next comet…
March 1st, 2009 at 5:11 pm
I tried to see Lulin last night… I couldn’t see anything. And I was trying with a TELESCOPE! I scanned the area over and over and over and I never saw anything.
Either I was rusty, either there was too much light pollution in that area.
March 1st, 2009 at 5:54 pm
Wow. Last week I saw Lulin very clearly with binoculars, and I live in a very light-polluted area. It was right next to Saturn, which made it easy to find. Glad I had the foresight to do it “the easy way.” What is everyone else’s excuse?
I even took photos with a 200mm zoom lens. Not spectacular photos, but the comet was very clear.
March 1st, 2009 at 6:36 pm
I was at a star party last night at the Whipple Observatory visitor center near Tucson last night and saw it (along with the Orion Nebula-cool!). The astronomer who found it for us had a good scope but it is starting to get hard to see-it’s moving away pretty fast.
March 1st, 2009 at 7:20 pm
DArn! After Jupiter got smacked with Shoemaker/Levi, I was kinda hoping for a comet impact on the moon. What a great visual that would be,,,if we survived the fallout,,,(ARG! Tektites falling all over and some are really BIG).
GAry 7
March 2nd, 2009 at 6:26 am
I tried (with a ludicrous amount of overoptimism) to observe it with the naked eye. I was definitely looking in the right place (following the track from Spica to Saturn to Regulus to its current position slightly further on), but saw nothing. Then again, a few photons from it probably hit my retinas, so I’m happy.
March 2nd, 2009 at 10:16 am
Same here in the UK (only my problem is a) trying to find the darned thing using the published data and b) tempermental weather!)
March 3rd, 2009 at 6:06 am
Just kowing that there is a visitor out there that will not come back for 20 + million years is what made me look for the comet. I was hoping to see the green hugh, however no camara available. Just a fuzzy white patch is all you get. Maybe next time, HaHa.