Comet Leonard shrinking fast

[OzEclipse]

Happy New Year Everyone!!

Comet Leonard shrinking fast
December 31st, 2021.

All good things must come to a end. The comet's tail has been rapidly shrinking and fading last few nights. Despite this, it is still a striking telescopic visual and photographic subject. I've just had to re-activate the "long range sensors."

The starlike nucleus is still an easy naked eye object somewhere around magnitude 4.5-4.8(in-out estimate) but the tail is no longer visible or at best very difficult to detect with the naked eye.

Still providing visually rewarding view in binoculars or small telescopes with several degrees of tail visible with optical instruments.

Photo: HDR taken with prime focus of a Vixen VC200L 1280mm f 6.4 scope.

Exposures ISO 1600
10 x 90s, 6 x 40s, 8 x 10s
Field of view of this frame approximately 1 x 1.5 degrees.

Two friends, Phil and Felicity have been staying during the week for comet observing. They had each gone home on Thursday and Friday. So here I was, NYE & all alone. Even the neighbours had taken off to town.

Total darkness, no neighbours. On went the music, bluetooth speaker on the rear deck pumping music into the back yard. Out came the reclining camp banana chair.

After the comet set behind the trees, I did some more observing. Then saw in the new year kicking back enjoying the "wondrous glory of the everlasting stars."

Don't get me wrong, I do enjoy having visitors, but I equally enjoy the solitude, stillness of the dark. It is also very special.

Joe

[messier 111]

magnificent tail , thx .

[helicon]

Nice catch. I actively looked for it last eve with my 15x70 SkyMasters. I saw Venus, about 60% illuminated and Mercury as well. Looking down and to the left of Mercury I was unable to detect it in the glow above the horizon. There was as moment when I thought I saw some faint nebulosity through the binos but it was very fleeting, so I'm not counting it as confirmed.

[OzEclipse]

Nice catch. I actively looked for it last eve with my 15x70 SkyMasters. I saw Venus, about 60% illuminated and Mercury as well. Looking down and to the left of Mercury I was unable to detect it in the glow above the horizon. There was as moment when I thought I saw some faint nebulosity through the binos but it was very fleeting, so I'm not counting it as confirmed.

Michael,
Tonight, or last night...it's now 3am??? I could see 9 degrees of tail in my Orion 9x63 mini Giant binos. More than the previous night when i took this photo. I'm blaming forward scattering.

Joe

[helicon]

Nice catch. I actively looked for it last eve with my 15x70 SkyMasters. I saw Venus, about 60% illuminated and Mercury as well. Looking down and to the left of Mercury I was unable to detect it in the glow above the horizon. There was as moment when I thought I saw some faint nebulosity through the binos but it was very fleeting, so I'm not counting it as confirmed.

Michael,
Tonight, or last night...it's now 3am??? I could see 9 degrees of tail in my Orion 9x63 mini Giant binos. More than the previous night when i took this photo. I'm blaming forward scattering.

Joe

Last night, 12-31-2021 - around 5:15-5:45. pm local time

[OzEclipse]

Nice catch. I actively looked for it last eve with my 15x70 SkyMasters. I saw Venus, about 60% illuminated and Mercury as well. Looking down and to the left of Mercury I was unable to detect it in the glow above the horizon. There was as moment when I thought I saw some faint nebulosity through the binos but it was very fleeting, so I'm not counting it as confirmed.

Michael,
Tonight, or last night...it's now 3am??? I could see 9 degrees of tail in my Orion 9x63 mini Giant binos. More than the previous night when i took this photo. I'm blaming forward scattering.

Joe

Last night, 12-31-2021 - around 5:15-5:45. pm local time

My 9 deg tail was 1-1-22 at 1130 UT

[Bigzmey]

Happy New Year to, Joe!

Nice shot of the comet, glad that you keep enjoying it. We had rain, so I could not meet new year observing, like you and Michael.

Nice catch. I actively looked for it last eve with my 15x70 SkyMasters. I saw Venus, about 60% illuminated and Mercury as well. Looking down and to the left of Mercury I was unable to detect it in the glow above the horizon. There was as moment when I thought I saw some faint nebulosity through the binos but it was very fleeting, so I'm not counting it as confirmed.

Michael,
Tonight, or last night...it's now 3am??? I could see 9 degrees of tail in my Orion 9x63 mini Giant binos. More than the previous night when i took this photo. I'm blaming forward scattering.

Joe

Last night, 12-31-2021 - around 5:15-5:45. pm local time

Catching it from city could be tricky. It is low to horizon and on top of light pollution you get a layer of haze. I will try today evening. At 5:30pm local time it should be ~10 deg above horizon. It might be a bit lower for your location Michael but relative position to the planets should be the same. SkySafari predicts ~6 mag, should be doable with binoculars.

[JayTee]

Joe, that is a stunning image.

Thank you for sharing it with us. Mostly what it did for me was to add to my gloom about having zero opportunities either visual or Imaging to experience this comet. I'm especially thankful that you shared your images.

Happy New Year

[OzEclipse]

Joe, that is a stunning image.

Thank you for sharing it with us. Mostly what it did for me was to add to my gloom about having zero opportunities either visual or Imaging to experience this comet. I'm especially thankful that you shared your images.

Happy New Year

JayTee,

You'll always have Neowise which we missed out on and seemed to put on a much better show. I saw many photos of Neowise tail arching right across big landscapes. The north had a much better show than this apparition of Leonard. While a couple of degrees of faint tail was visible at peak, the big tail was mostly photographic and visually, this was a telescopic, binocular comet.
Happy New Year

Joe