[BAA Comets] C/2013 US10 (Catalina) this morning

[Andrew Robertson]

You both beat me to it (mind you I did go back to bed for an hour). I got my first visual view this morning and made a sketch through my 12" Mewlon (will post to you separately). I could see it easily in my 4" refractor but have to confess that I couldn't see it in my wide field 8.5 x 50 bins - you have younger eyes than me Nick :-) Mind you that nearby moon and a fairly close Venus wasn't helping. Visually through the 12" I could see a longish thin tail and a very tenuous stubby tail which seemed almost like an extension of the coma. There was a stellar nucleus. Sketched with a 40mm Pentax e/p giving x90 and a 0.7 deg FOV, detail confirmed with 27mm Pan giving x135 and 0.5 deg FOV. I estimated the longer tail to be about 10' long.

Andrew

-----Original Message-----
From: Comets-disc [mailto:comets-disc-bounces at britastro.org] On Behalf Of Peter Carson
Sent: 04 December 2015 08:04
To: BAA Comets discussion list <comets-disc at britastro.org>
Subject: Re: [BAA Comets] C/2013 US10 (Catalina) this morning

Good morning Nick,
We both had the same thoughts this morning......my post crossed with yours. 
Great image , especially with a telephoto lens. I was able to get at
2013US10 from home with my 315mm reflector although the comet is so large it doesn't fit on my camera chip.
I should have used my wider field 100mm refractor but I was in a bit of a rush and grabbed what I could.
Peter

-----Original Message-----
From: Nick James
Sent: Friday, December 04, 2015 7:53 AM
To: Comets-disc at britastro.org
Subject: [BAA Comets] C/2013 US10 (Catalina) this morning

Morning all,

As forecast the sky cleared around 2am after rain and the transparency was very good this morning at 5. The Moon is getting closer to the comet but it is now only a thick crescent so is becoming less of a problem.
Since the comet is still too low for my main telescope I drove to a dark site east of Chelmsford and set up there.

At around 5:30 I had set up my imaging equipment (Canon EOS550D + 200mm, f/2.8L lens on a Vixen Sphinx mount) and so started searching with 10x50 bins. The comet was definitely easier to see in the bins than my last chance a week ago but the conditions were a lot better.

This image is a stack of 22 x 30s exposures from 05:41 - 05:54 not tracked on the comet. The dust trail and gas tail show up nicely.

http://www.nickdjames.com/2013US10/2013us10_20151204_0554_ndj.jpg

Nick.
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