COMET ISON PAGE

Will it live up to its press notices? Comets are notoriously unpredictble, but this one has more potential than most, perhaps since simmilar Ikeya-Seki in 1965. See the Sky and Telescope home page.

Comet C/2012 S1 (ISON) now (Oct. 29) rises about 3 a.m. (New Orleans). We go off Daylight Time on Sunday, Nov. 3, and ISON will rise at about 2:20 a.m. An hour before sinrise it will be at an altitude of about 40 degrees (see below), at about magnitude 9. Optimum observing period will be about Nov. 24-early December, the very best ought to be just after perihelion, Nov. 28-Dec. 1, in the early morning sky, 45 min or so before sunrise, in the ESE. Good luck!