Comet C/2021 O1 (Nishimura)
Taken by Mike Olason on August 1, 2021 @
Tucson, Arizona
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Details:
A bright new comet was discovered by H. Nishimura of Japan on July 21. The comet was very close to the Sun as seen from Earth and was located on the other side of the Sun as seen from Earth. In the 1 August 2021 images taken through holes in the clouds and in a bright morning twilight sky above the clouds Comet C/2021 O1 (Nishimura) was magnitude about magnitude 10, in the images one could see a coma at least 0.02 degrees wide and a tail about 0.02 degrees long at a position angle of 298 degrees from the coma. The comet was 158.4 million miles from Earth. The images were taken when the comet was only 5 to 9 degrees above the eastern horizon. The comet will reach perihelion in it's orbit on 12 August 2021 when it will be 74 million miles from the Sun and may brighten to magnitude 9. The comet will make it's close approach to Earth on 5 August 2021 at 158 million miles. The comet is moving into the morning twilight so if one wants to view it or image it they should do so in the next few days before it becomes lost in the morning twilight and then moves behind the eastern horizon the second week of August.
The images from 26 July 2021 were taken under similar conditions and showed the comet at about magnitude 9. I am not sure how the clouds, twilight and images taken only 5 to 9 degrees above the horizon affect the magnitude calculations determined by Astrometrica.
As always, click on the bigger images to get a better resolution image.
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