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(meteorobs) Hale/Bopp Obser Feb 18 ZAYGE




Feb 18

Well, it rained during most of the nite. From my work location in La Mesa,
Ca. I checked about every half hour to see if the clouds had gone away. Not
until about 05:15 did I notice stars. I immediately went outside with the
14X100's and 7X50's and a fellow co-worker to share this with. Under about a
4.6 sky Limiting magnitude and relatively clear skies, Hale/Bopp was an easy
target with the naked eye. The tail is barely noticeable. Thru the binoculars
I estimated a dust tail of about 2.7 degrees and with the very thin looking
ion tail it looked to be about 3.5 to 4 degrees total. It is pointing
slightly towards the North and to the west. My coma and nucleus magnitude
estimate by comparing to Deneb (1.3)d is now at 1.4 to 1.5.  The southerly
jet still looks active. For some reason that jet doesn't appear to have
rotated like I reported in yesterdays description...must have been an
illusion? I cannot perceive any parts of the comet separating as some reports
I'm reading. The people who made these reports were using a 16" scope...so
maybe something is there? But I forgot to mention in yesterday's report, that
while looking thru my 10"SCT, I didn't get any impression of this. Last night
I developed my black and white film for yesterday mornings coma and nucleus
photographic effort with the 10". The negatives don't show any splitting
either. It looks like I got some good negatives to print up. Hopefully the
color film will be just as successful. Hopefully tomorrow morning before
going to work I'll be able to make a couple exposures of the whole comet with
the 4" again? ...one in black and white and one in color.
George Zay
La Mesa, ca
Long 116 west
Lat 32 north