ISON not weather but still something to watch

I haven't been able to see it myself; too many trees around here, but if you can see to the horizon wherever you are, it's a good time to take a look just before sunup. It's about to disappear into the glare of the sun soon. It'll emerge eventually, but there's no telling if it'll still be bright by then. More information here:

www.skyandtelescope.com
 
I had my first view of ISON this morning. I woke up at 5am and the sky looked clear out my north-facing window. So I threw something on, rummaged for the binoculars and headed outside...where I saw fast moving clouds all over the east horizon. They were rolling along in this typical Flagstaff orographic pattern where they haul off at warp speeds & you think a big batch is quickly moving out of the way, only for another huge new clump to materialize in the same spot..over and over again. But it looked it was consistently clearer just a bit further east. So I jumped in the car and drove a few miles east to a spot that had some clearing in the sky near Spica.

The comet was a pretty quick find when there weren't clouds squatting on top of it. The coma sported a soft aqua color and a short, maybe 15 arc minute long tail. Approaching twilight, moonlight, haze and intermittent clouds--the comet was packing a decent punch to kick through that mess. I didn't attempt to estimate magnitude. Degree of condensation was around 3 from the binocular perspective. I need to see if I can squeak in a telescopic observation in the next couple days.

Digital illustration showing the comet as it appeared above Spica
img2013111701_ISONlg.jpg
 
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