The official Comet ISON observation thread

Astronomy geeks, dust off your pocket protectors and gather 'round. It's the official Comet ISON observation thread.

Professional astronomers are predicting that this comet, which is currently outside the orbit of Jupiter, will be visible to the naked eye by autumn and then becomes as bright as the full moon when it skims within 2 million miles of the sun in late November. It should continue to put on a spectacular show in December and January and into February as it heads back out on its orbit to the frozen outer reaches of the solar system.

http://science.nasa.gov/science-news/science-at-nasa/2013/18jan_cometison/

 

Comet ISON :



The Hubble Space Telescope captured this view of Comet ISON, C/2012 S1 (ISON), on May 8, 2013 as it streaked between the orbits of Jupiter and Mars at 48,000 mph. This annotated view shows the comet's scale and direction of motion.
Credit: NASA, ESA, and the Hubble Heritage Team (STScI/AURA) - See more at: http://www.space.com/22002-comet-ison-timeline-sun-flyby.html#sthash.Zc1Cfih6.dpuf




http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C/2012_S1

 

John Bortle of Sky and Telescope magazine is predicting a far less spectacular appearance.

So my forecast is that Comet ISON will develop more slowly in the autumn morning sky than initially thought. It won’t reach naked-eye detectability until around the 10th of November, about three weeks before rounding the Sun. It will brighten steadily but not exceed 2nd or 3rd magnitude before disappearing into the morning twilight just a week shy of its November 28th perihelion. At that time a short, not particularly bright tail should trail the comet’s intensifying coma.

http://www.skyandtelescope.com/observing/highlights/Comet-ISON-Approaches-211408441.html

 

http://www.space.com/23263-comet-ison-green-photo.html





All through November the comet will be getting brighter in the Eastern sky before dawn.
It should look something like this on November 5th:




What to see in November:

http://waitingforison.wordpress.com/november-2013/