by Dan Durkin
From my vantage in Northern California cattle country, east of the Snow Mountain Wilderness, I observed the two ATLAS comets that have been dominating recent astronomy news.
On Monday (November 17) afternoon, a rain system stalled over the region and dark ominous clouds unleashed a deluge, drenching the pastures and swelling the creeks. By nightfall, the rain relented, replaced by a steady misting. For a brief time, Cassiopeia was discernible in the moist heavens, but soon retreated into the white abyss. The forecast promised clear skies later in the night.
I awoke at 3:15 AM (November 18) to brilliant Orion and the Milky Way standing tall in the south. The stars dazzled. Jupiter beamed. The sky was clear! The earth was damp. I erected my telescope, a TEC140 (f/7) refractor, and after a gander at Orion’s grand nebula, I initiated my hunt for comets.
C/2025 K1 was a surprisingly easy catch. It was well placed in high, dark sky at the feet of Ursa Major. Capture was with a 19mm Nagler Type 7 eyepiece yielding 52x. It was immediately obviously a comet, with a tail stretching west towards the top of my field of view, but with a bright elongated “nucleus”. This is the comet that has fragmented after perihelion. The tail faded about around 1/4 FOV, which puts it around 24’. I zoomed in on the “nuclei” with first an 8mm Delos (122x) and then 4.5 mm Delos (218x), then settled on oscillating between my 19mm and 8mm. The views gave a strong impression of a brighter, knotted structure extending within the tail. Averted vision often tantalized the presence of at two distinct knots with a ghostly presence of more. I struggled to master my eye on the extended nucleus, and a brighter star below the nucleus competed for my attention. C/2025 K1 was a visual delight, and among our recent bright comets, for visual interest, I place it behind Lemmon but ahead of SWAN.
Comet 3I/ATLAS was less visually interesting, though more philosophically so, being a visitor from beyond our solar system. I picked it up around 4:30 AM when Porrima sufficiently cleared the ridge to the east; 3I was 1.5 degrees south of it. Capture was with the 19mm and it appeared as a small faint smudge with a slightly brighter center. The 8mm added little. No indication of a tail. I followed it until about 6 AM and the imminent sunrise. One hinderance to viewing 3I was that it was solidly within the morning zodiacal light.
When I was not looking down, I was entertained by the Leonids above. Leo the Lion was hurling meteors at Orion the Hunter and other surrounding constellations. I caught three that left especially bright afterglows, one southbound meteor exploded in a flash, and one slowly fell through the sky with a greenish glow. And no, none this night made a sound that I heard.
