Weather permitting, the comet could be as bright as a first-magnitude star on the brightness scale of night sky objects (the lower the number, the brighter the object). After months appearing in the Southern Hemisphere night sky, Comet Pan-STARRS will make its first appearance in the ...
Tapping a comet will open an information page for it that includes a link to display its position in the sky. A small magnitude value indicates that an object is bright. Several other much dimmer comets are in the evening sky at this time. (Image credit: SkySafari app) Using an app to...
bright enough to pick out in less than perfect skies. By a stroke of good luck, Saturn will be nearby (only 7.5° southeast) to help point the way. For observers at mid-northern altitudes, extinction — the dimming of a celestial object due to absorption of light by the atmosphere ...
The head (or coma) of Comet ATLAS is big, albeit "very faint and ghostly," Bortle said, which doesn't make sense. "If it's a truly significant visitor, it should be considerably sharper in appearance. Instead we see, at best, a quite modestly condensed object with only a pinpoint st...
On the very next evening (Wednesday, June 19), the somewhat wider gibbous moon will have shifted its position relative to both Spica and Saturn, appearing to be about 7 degrees below and to the left of the ringed planet and form a sort of "squashed triangle" in the southern sky. Remembe...