Photos

Firstly, apologies because I'm sure this will be only one of many shots of the McNaught comet to pop up on TrekEarth...

From our good friends at Wikipedia:

"Comet McNaught, also known as the Great Comet of 2007 and given the designation C/2006 P1, is a non-periodic comet discovered on August 7, 2006 by British-Australian astronomer Robert H. McNaught. It made perihelion on January 12, 2007, and became easily visible to the naked eye for observers in the Southern Hemisphere. Soon after confirmation of the discovery, Southern hemisphere observers began following the comet to refine the orbit. From August through November 2006, the comet was imaged and tracked as it moved through Ophiuchus and Scorpius, giving an estimated brightness as high as 12. Then, for most of December, the comet was lost in the glare of the sun. Upon recovery in late December, it became apparent that the comet was brightening rapidly. It reached naked eye brightness in early January 2007. It was visible in the northern hemisphere near Venus, in Sagittarius and surrounding constellations, until about 13 January 2007. Perihelion (closest approach to the sun) was 12 January 2007 at a distance of 0.17 AU. This was close enough to the Sun to be observed by the space-based Solar and Heliospheric Observatory (SOHO). The comet entered SOHO's LASCO C3 camera's field of view 12 January 2007, and was viewable on the web in near real-time. The comet exited SOHO's field of view on 16 January 2007. Due to its proximity to the sun, the northern hemisphere ground-based viewers had a short window for viewing, and the comet could only be spotted during bright twilight, immediately after sunset. As it reached perihelion on January 12, it became the brightest comet since Comet Ikeya-Seki in 1965. The comet was dubbed the Great Comet of 2007 by Space.com. On January 13 and 14, 2007, the comet attained an estimated maximum apparent magnitude of -6.0, as reported by several observers in the Northern hemisphere. The comet was visible in daylight about 5°- 10° southeast of the sun from January 12 to 14, with a peak brightness of magnitude -5.5. After passing the sun, Comet McNaught became visible in the Southern hemisphere. In Australia, according to Siding Spring Observatory at Coonabarabran, where the comet was discovered, it was to have reached its theoretical peak in brightness on Sunday, 14 January 2007 just after sunset, when it would have been visible for 23 minutes after sunset. On 15 January 2007 the comet was observed at Perth Observatory with an estimated apparent magnitude of -4.0."


I captured this image just after 10pm, looking southwest. I'd spent the better part of an hour at the Cape Liptrap Lighthouse, looking southwest in the hope of spotting it shortly after sunset. Having given up in disgust, I packed up and headed home. About twenty minutes up the road I looked out the window and spotted it, and pulled over next to the sheep.
It was easily visible with the naked eye last night in the southwest from about 9:45pm to 11:45pm, from my vantage point here in Gippsland far away from the city lights. The tail is amazing, reaching across half of the sky.

My photos completely fail to do it justice. This one was an 8-second, remotely-triggered, mirror-lockup exposure. Levels tweaked in CS2, resized.