This comet is one of many that have been discovered by the Lincoln Laboratory Near Earth Asteroid Research project. This image was taken on November 17, 2001, the night before the great Leonid meteor storm of 2001. We observed a few nice Leonid meteors that night while imaging. Of course, the following night we saw a spectacular meteor display!
At the time this image was taken in November, the comet was crossing Perseus and picking up speed. This comet was an easy target for binoculars. Although the comet was only about 18th magnitude when it was discovered in December 2000 by the LINEAR one-meter telescope in New Mexico, it continued to brighten slowly each month thereafter. For Northern Hemisphere observers, this comet was well up in the northeast after dusk and remained up all night.
This is an unguided composite CCD image consisting of twenty exposures each taken through red, green and blue filters with an ST-8E and CFW-8 color filter wheel using a 6-inch Takahashi FCT-150 refractor telescope at f7. This image was taken at the Sunglow Ranch located in southeastern Arizona.
Constellation: Perseus
RA:03h 19m Dec:+38d 49'.
November 17, 2001 at 0530 U.T.
Image by Sid Leach
Sunglow Ranch, Arizona.
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