Comet Lulin

February 23, 2009
7:45-9:15pm CST
Partly Cloudy/Hazy skies
wind calm - 15 degrees temp
Snow cover present
Port Barrington, IL
10" Dob.
Hot Glug

Lulin was jointly discovered by Asian astronomers in July of 2007. Quanzhi Ye from China first saw the comet on images obtained by Chi-Sheng Lin from Taiwan, at the Lu-lin Observatory.

The most interesting characteristic of this comet is its orbit. Lulin is actually moving in the opposite direction as the planets, so its apparent velocity will be quite fast. Estimates are it will be moving about 5 degrees a day across the sky, so when viewed with a telescope or binoculars, you may be able to see the comet's apparent motion against the background stars.

Using a 10" Dobsonian with a 10mm eyepiece, Comet Lulin was easily found just a couple degrees south of Saturn in the eastern sky. Looking like a fuzzy greenish/blue dot, I could just make out a tail - through very short and stout. I was unable to see the antitail.

Lulin is composed of frozen ice, dust and gases. Cyanogen gas and diatomic carbon present in it, when melted by sunlight, make it appear green. Lulin has a parabolic orbit and it takes about 50 million years to revolve around the Sun; therefore it will not repeat in the foreseeable future so this is considered a very rare celestial event. Using a 45mm eyepiece, you can see Comet Lulin and Saturn in the same view.

Saturn is becoming a treat to view in the eastern evening sky. Saturn was visible with rings edge on. Four moons were visible including Rhea, Mimas, Titan and Dione. I could just barely make out some darker creme cloud bands. There is very little contrast in cloud bands vs Jupiter which reveals much more.

I also viewed Messier 40. M40 is one of the three "curiosities," or unusual objects, in Messier's catalog. It is a double star, which was also cataloged later as Winnecke 4 (WNC 4). TYC6539-2293-1 is the larger of the two stars. I am not sure why this formation was cataloged as a Messier object - other than the fact that Charles Messier did not want it to be mistaken as a comet. M40 is found in Ursa Major and is best seen using a 10mm eyepiece.

On February 24th, Comet Lulin will be at its closest and brightest. I will attempt to photograph it as well as Jupiter and Venus - with weather permitting.