Where is the best place to view the green comet?

pothole. If you want to experience your green wonder, you have to get up early: “Five-thirty or 6 in the morning is definitely a good time,” explains Thomas Baker, stargazer at Westhavelland Nature Park Department. . From January 28 at the latest, C/2022 E3 ZTF, better known as the “green comet,” can be seen well in the direction of the North Pole Star, especially when the waxing moon is already setting. “The comet stays in roughly the same region of the sky all night,” Baker says. However, you can hardly see the moving celestial body with the naked eye. “You need binoculars,” says Becker.

The discovery of the new wandering orb and its imminent approach on March 2, 2022 is just around the corner. Everyone now wants to know when and how best to discover the new hiker. A photo taken by the Astronomical Observatory in Palermo, for example, promises something remarkable. Surrounded by a bright green halo, the radiant structure seemed to shoot through space.

Green Comet: Very close to Earth on February 1st

According to calculations, the comet will make its closest approach to Earth on February 1st. Then it should be “only” 42 million km away. By astronomical standards, this is a stone’s throw. Mars, for example, averages 70 million km. When C/2022 E3 ZTF approaches very close to its orbit, it should also shine brightest. “Like a cloud of fog,” says Baker. “Pulp glows brightly. Around it is a cloud indicating the tail.” Becker had already looked at the comet in the Star Garden through a telescope.

Axel Schwope of the X-ray Astronomy Working Group at the Leibniz Institute for Astrophysics (AIP) wants to dampen the enthusiasm of stargazers before they expect a colorful spectacle and become disappointed. “Experts have set the star’s apparent magnitude at 5.6,” Schop says. This roughly corresponds to the weakest brightness of a star, which is 6. The apparent magnitude of a celestial body is given as a number with the suffix “magnitudo”, which means “magnitude”. The higher the number, the brighter the star will glow to the naked eye. Ancient Babylonian astronomers only had gradations from one to six. Today more units are possible due to telescopes.

Green Comet: Those who live in the country have an advantage

“You also need good conditions,” says Schwope. Of course, this requires a clear sky, that is, good weather. Then you have to choose a good observatory. Of course, if you stand under a lamppost in the city, you won’t see anything. For city dwellers, for example, it is enough to choose an unlit place in the garden. If you live in the countryside, you can go out into the garden. “A simple pair of binoculars will suffice,” says Schop. However, no more than one type of small gray-and-white mist cloud could be seen.

Astrophysicist Schwope recommends Stellarium Mobile point right around February 1st. It also shows real-life horoscopes, for example. The green comet is said to be located in the middle of the constellation Giraffe, also known as Camelopardalis, on February 1st. According to Baker, the director of Star park, the green effect can be achieved with a higher resolution camera that has been exposed a little longer.

This was also confirmed by Simon Plait, Head of the Urania Planetarium in Potsdam. Refers to a collection of images already available on the Internet. “Here’s kind of a snapshot of England, for example.” The image was displayed for only a tenth of a second. “It has a little green touch.” With longer exposures, the yield is probably better. However, you also need special equipment that compensates for the Earth’s rotation. According to Plate, hobby telescopes only show green if they are very expensive and large. “A normal department store telescope shows a slightly fuzzy white spot,” says Plitt. The color is attributed to carbon in the comet, which can glow green under very specific physical conditions.

Everything depends on the weather now

Because of the unfavorable weather forecast, Urania in Potsdam hasn’t planned anything yet. However, if decisive changes are made by February 1st and the sky is clear, one may become energetic. Then we set up a telescope in the middle of the pool area. It’s like clearing. In addition, the comet will then be very high,” Blight says. However, it does not yet look like starry nights. The German Meteorological Service predicts, for example, next weekend “On a Friday night heavily cloudy to overcast And some light rain.

Thomas Baker, head of Star Park Westhavelland, says the experience we’ll have when the weather is good isn’t quite certain yet. The last time a comet passed Earth was about 50,000 years ago. It is not known how many times he was close to the Sun and how much material he lost in the process. Thus, it is difficult to say how bright it is. “It could be hue or pfoe,” says Baker. Comets are unpredictable. Comet C/2020 F3 discovered on March 27, 2020 went badly at first. At the end of July of the same year, he caused a sensation as the beautiful double-tailed comet Neowise.