Observation Log: C/2020 F3 Neowise comet

Date- 20 July 2020
Time- 20:30 hrs- 20:40 hrs
Location- Sirohi, Rajasthan
50 x 20 Binocular and 90 mm x 25 mm Refractor
Conditions - Partly clouded
Object- C/2020 F3 Neowise comet

Finally seen comet Neowise after chasing it for almost fifteen days. Chasing comet is a different kind of thrill. They are swift and ghostly objects in the sky. You miss them by a day or two they will be in different direction of sky. So you also need to be very fast. This comet appeared in the morning sky early of this month. July is the monsoon month in India and sky can remain overcast for months. But hope is the only key and one can hope that clouds will get apart and  comet will reveal itself to you. Its a fantasy that every astronomer have on cloudy days. 

Sketch of Neowise by me on 20 July 2020 From Sirohi, Rajasthan. Comet was near to theta Ursa Majoris.

I spent a week to see this comet in early hours of morning. But clouds can make you feel fool. For two days entire sky was clear and clouds only gathered in the area where exactly comet was. On those days I observed  moon, Jupiter, Saturn and Mars very clearly. Then comet moved towards east in the sky surpassing the sun and appeared in the evening sky. Again, with full of hope, I started digging in evening sky. This time also clouds never disappointed me and appeared exactly in the same location of comet. For next three four days I spiritually continued my search. Meanwhile social media Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp were flooded with images of this Comet from worldwide photographers. Those images are really beautiful and tempted me to continuously look for comet. 

Finally on 20th July, evening sky started getting clear at north-west horizon where comet was located. I was hoping that it will stay clear till twilight get over. Nowadays in summer, twilight disappear by 8:15 pm. After 8:15 pm only one can see celestial object in west side. I started looking for comet. I  was searching that area for 5 minutes and then suddenly I located comet. I was jumped with joy and excitement. It was blue hairy hazy object not far that 6 to 7 degrees from Theta Ursa Majoris star. I quickly set up telescope with 25 mm eyepiece. It took time to locate it in telescope. From telescope its tail was not visible properly but its coma were bright blue and hazy.

After Hale-Bopp comet I have seen this comet with tail. I have seen comet Macholz and Catalina but they were just hazy balls without tail. Observing comet with tail is like looking at lion with mane. It will give you goosebumps. These tails are the real attraction of comets. Comets are clumsy fragile objects made up from water, different gaseous and volatile material.When they are far from sun all material remains intact to comet. As they come near to sun, gaseous and volatile material start melting and slipping away from main body of comet. This appear as a tail. Not all comets displays tail as a mentioned like comet Macholz and Catalina they were appeared as a hazy balls in sky.  

I started my interest in astronomy due to comets only. In 1996, my father took me and and my little sister to small hill side, near our home to show this fantastic object.  It was hairy white blue object. Hale-Bopp was the name of that comet. After that comet I started to look up and was amazed with celestial drama. Hale-Bopp was visible to the naked eye for record 18 months from May 1996 and faded to naked eye by December 1997. It was discovered on 23 July 1995 by Alan Hale and Thomas Bopp separately. This year 2020 is the 25th anniversary of Hale-Bopp discovery. 

Comet NEOWISE was discovered by a Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE) space based telescope. This WISE space telescope runs a different project and this comet was discovered under near earth object (NEO) detection project NEOWISE. Hence it named as comet 'Neowise.'

I remember a line from a comet hunter David Levy about comet 'Comets are like cats; they have tails, and they do precisely what they want'. Take it as metaphor, because of their unpredictable nature. When astronomers expect great show from them they just gives fuzz. Sometimes they unexpectedly show a great displays. Astronomers has predicted Neowise will appear in evening sky till October but after July its visibility will gradually decrease to unaided eyes. 

Sketch of Comet Neowise on 21 July 2020 by me from Sirohi Rajasthan. Its position shifted on second day.

Telescope, Jupiter and Sketching

My father gave me first telescope when I pass 12 grade. Actually we went to buy a binocular but we ended up in purchasing telescope. It was good deal in binocular budget. My new telescope was 90mm reflector telescope. I was very much excited to see through it. First light descended in my telescope from heaven was the light of Jupiter. The greatest planet in our solar system. It was stunning view of planet Jupiter. The bright yellow disc with brown and orange belts on it. Two belts on equator region was very prominent. It was much like of cricket ball with seam. Then there were four bright lights specs from some distance of this Jupiter disc all align in equatorial plane. These four light specs were four Galilean satellites. This was permanently imprinted in my memory. It was my first observation. On that day planet Jupiter gave me very encouraging picture of upcoming telescopic observation.

After Moon I find Jupiter is the most promising candidate for the telescopic observation. It is big and shows observable features on its discs. These features included it's equatorial belts, polar region belts, great red spot and many storm like features. Jupiter is gaseous giant planet so it's features keep changing and always shows us something new. It's four satellites displays eclipse show. Every thing happens near Jupiter is very rapidly so we can see changes in one night only.

Jupiter through telescope, Image taken by my friend Ashish Sharma with telescope and mobile camera combination

Now when you have telescope then you should also take down your own observation from it. For long time I only used to observe objects through telescope I was not having idea how to record my observations. Then I found book for beginner observer, 'the Sky' written by David Levy. This book become holy book for me. Levy has given many techniques to record observation. When I started recording my observations I preferred to draw objects like old time sky observers rather than taking photographs. I did this because drawing can develop observation skills. Capturing direct image with camera can not give always good observations as most of the times one can get image with blur lines. Drawing does not required great skill or knowledge of art. One can just start doing it and he/she goes on improving in it.

Galileo's sketches of Jupiter, I wondered how he manage to do such nice sketches of Jupiter with four satellites through his crude telescope, Image source, Internet

Jupiter is good to draw but it is challenging too. Jupiter day is less than 10 hours, means everything on Jupiter rotate very fast and scenario changes rapidly. So, you get very few minutes to draw it. If you take much time then picture at Jupiter region change. Due to such fast rotation Jupiter has pressed at polar region and slightly expanded at equatorial region. Jupiter looks oblate in shape due to this. There are features on Jupiter like equatorial belts, in between these belts there are bright belts are called as zones and these belts and zones are disturbed by festoons and bridges.

Jupiter sketch by me, we can see its moon Io at left edge of Jupiter and its shadow on Jupiter, Upperside I sketched Jupiter and its four moons

I take 5 to 10 minutes to look at details appearing on Jupiter surface and after that I sketch it. First I sketch outlines and then fill details in it. One can observe many detail on disc with bigger telescopes. I did most of the observation with the 90 mm telescope so for me it is easy to observe features on Jupiter's equatorial region, at polar region I can not observe much. Even colors are difficult to identify. I started to use color pencils for drawing but after sometime I realizes that it is not giving correct picture of actual observation so I stopped to use color pencil. I now use just pencil with 2HB or 4HB. For color I just write the color of band. Observing planets also required good sky conditions.

When I see my old observations and recent ones I can see how my observation has improved my sketching and details. Every time I look at Jupiter, it shows me new scenarios. Sometimes his belt disappears, new storm appear on it, its moons plays hide and seek around it, also one can see moons shadows marching on it. What else one observer wanted to see. 

Jupiter Sketch by me, we can see Great Red Spot a storm on upper center of sketch