My alarm went off at 4.15am. I headed east to Paglesham, Essex, about 8 miles away, where the sky is darker as you look out over the sea. I thought the sky was clear when I left home, but as I moved away from the lights of the Southend area I could see a large bank of cloud approaching from the West.  When I arrived at about 04.50am the cloud covered half the sky and appeared to be moving fast. I wondered at that point if it was worth staying because I knew that by the time the comet rose to a useful altitude it would probably be 100% cloudy.

 I persevered, set up, scanned around near the horizon and thought I could see the comet in 7x50 bins. A picture with my DSLR confirmed it. It was then a race between the cloud and the rising comet. As the sky clouded over the only area remaining clear contained the comet...how lucky was that! I continued until about 05.50 by which time it was completely cloudy.

 At around 05.40am I could see about 2 degrees of tail in my 7x50 bins and wondered if I could see the comet naked eye, but think it was probably my imagination.

 This image is a stack of 5 x 30 sec exposures with the cloud just out of the field of view. The image records a little more tail than I was seeing in Bino’s.

 I’m pleased I made the effort as it seems it was just the extreme east of the UK that was clear and this was the only time I’ve seen the comet visually.