C/2004 F4 Bradfield

Hi all.

Those of you following Comet Bradfield with SOHO may like to note that the comet is much brighter than expected - somewhere around mag -2 (indeed, it may have been a LOT brighter earlier today)!! The C3 coronograph starts to suffer from blooming (photon overflow onto nearby pixels) when objects get above mag -1 or so - and that's what's currently happening. The comet's magnitude is no doubt boosted from backscattering as we pass through its orbital plane, but hopefully may be still a very bright object come Thursday/Friday when it emerges from conjunction.

Clear skies.

Brian

Jon Shanklin picked up C/2004 F4 this morning at mag 2.6.

Brian

Another image from yesterday morning



David
Worth Hill Observatory
Dorset U.K.
www.dstrange.freeserve.co.uk

Cheers,
~Al

Dear List,

It seems the comet has survived its passage around the sun which is great news for us in the northern hemisphere.

It should a very exciting early May!

Anthony.

I tried to look for it after 3:30am this morning when I got home from work. The sky was beautifully clear - I saw an Iridium Flare, 2 bright Lyrids, a couple of satelites, and the entire Milky Way arm as clear as you would see it in a short exposure photograph - no exaggeration - but I couldn't confirm I saw THE comet... I THOUGHT I could, but clarity was not great through my tired eyes as it seemed to be quite near the horizon.

Was I looking in the right direction (towards sunrise), or just making my eyes almost see what I wanted to see? :roll:

Seanie.

I've uploaded a finder chart for Bradfield for the enxt couple of weeks to
www.irishastronomy.org/user_resources/fi...-bradfield-tabur.pdf

Also in there is comet Tabur (C/2003 T3). I've heard nothing about it on newsgroups, probably because its at mag 8.5, but it is listed in the bright comet list[1].

Cheers,
~Al

[1] cfa-www.harvard.edu/iau/Ephemerides/Comets/Soft03Cmt.txt where xephem gets it data from, probably the same for skymap et. al.