I participated in a NASA training seminar yesterday on the Deep Impact mission and was surprised to hear that after impact the expect the comet (9P/Tempel 1) will brighten 3 magnitudes, from 9 to 6. Personally I find it a little hard to imagine how lobbing a couple of hundred kilos of copper into a comet measuring some 4 x 4 x 9 km is going to throw up enough dust to brighten it that much. But then I never thought the Jovian impacts of SL/9 would have been so easily visible from Earth either. Unfortunately at the time of impact (very early on the morning of 4 July) the comet it will not be terribly well placed for viewing from Utah but it will be visible. This just might be something a few of us might want to put together a private star party in a site with dark skies and a low, flat SW horizon. BTW, the event will be very well placed for viewing from the Hawaiian Islands. Hmmm, now who here do we know that lives in Hawaii...? Patrick
Hi Patrick I attended the same NASA/IfA sponsored Deep Impact training here on Maui. At the time we were video linked w/ students on Iceland as we had some astronomers and astrogeoligists from there visiting us also associated w/ Deep Impact. Yes we are well placed for the DI event and will be observing w/ the Faulkes Robotic Scope here on Haleakala, this July 3rd @ 8:45 PM HST +/- 40 min. is the predicted impact time. If anyone is out this way then, just give me a call and we'll have a party up on Haleakala. aloha Rob
participants (2)
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Patrick Wiggins -
Rob Ratkowski