Comet ISON - maybe the comet of the century so far?

ISON, so far, now that it has passed its own conjunction with the Sun is proving to still remain a mystery. It is directly visible from Earth, coming out of the Sun's glare, but hasn't brightened up as much as was 'expected'. The word 'expected' should also be taken lightly with comets! Still, it is reckoned it is only close to its own sublimation line, where its frozen gases begin bursting out and shatter the crust to produce an even bigger dust tail.

A good website for past and current info I found is here
earthsky.org/space/big-sun-diving-comet-...-spectacular-in-2013


Hubble sees ISON:
www.irishastronomy.org/index.php?option=...2&id=97422&Itemid=40

And including Spitzer:
www.irishastronomy.org/index.php?option=...2&id=97421&Itemid=40


Seanie.

We'll just have to see Seanie, I guess there was a lot of disappointment during the last couple of weeks as it seemed to be not as bright as expected, but it is still early days yet

Keith.

well, it looks like this comet is brightening, see
www.spaceweather.com/archive.php?view=1&...5&month=11&year=2013

brightening in 2 magnitudes in the last week alone, reportedly naked eye brightness by now. With frosts forecast for next week, we might get a glimpse of this before it dives around the sun on the 28th.
here's hoping : cheer:

Now its reported at mag5.5, 10 times brighter then it was only 3 days ago !!!
the tail is over 3.5 degrees long giving it an estimated length of over 8million KMs, its uncertain whether the core has fragmented or is this due to eruptions on the surface, time will tell, it'll be in the fov of the STEREO solar observatories on nov21st,
We're getting a cold spell next week, maybe clear skies ?!? , possibly too late to see it due to it been too near the sun, but worth a shot if its clear and your up early.

Had a look for the comet this morning before sunrise, it's very faint !!
I think I was lucky to see it at all using 7x50 binos, just caught it before the sky brightened, the full moon didn't help.

Also, the ice was like concrete out there this morning : blink:

Got out early this morning myself and attempted to view and, if possible, get an image. I was unsuccessful with both, I could not see the comet in my 10x50s, there was a bank of cloud that was hugging the horizon, scanned below Spica and had to quit around seven, unfortunately work calls.

I think I will wait and see if it improves when it rounds the sun and make another attempt in the evening sky.

Man, was it cold this morning.

Paul