![]() When the comet was first discovered by Czech astronomer Lubos Kohoutek, it was so far away in our solar system, yet so intrinsically bright, that Dr. The world awaited this comet with eager anticipation and thousands of small telescopes were sold to an unsuspecting public hoping to catch this media-frenzied celestial visitor. In 1974-75, we had just seen the passage of "The Comet of the Century," Comet Kohoutek 1973-f, regretfully deemed to be the brightest comet perhaps ever seen in modern times. It was not until the winter of 1974-75 that the comet would become favorable for observations in evening skies by that time there were many times more observers - both amateur and professional - who were taking a keen interest in the nature of comets. With its orbital period of only 5.3 years, we would think that this comet would be easily visible at each pass, but this is certainly not the case it was not visible in 1959 because of the geometry of the Earth-Sun-Comet orientation, but it was observed very sparingly in subsequent passages. The comet in that year rapidly faded to magnitude 13 and was not seen again until 1954 when it reached magnitude 8.4 only for a very short period of time. Pajdusakova, each spotting the comet independently, thus this interloper sporting the names of all three who simultaneously found this comet at magnitude 9 as a very faint "smudge" of light, quite diffuse and without a nucleus or tail. Barely visible visually in our skies prior to the remarkable Comet West (1975n) in 1975, comet 45P.Ĭomet 45P photographed and provided by comet photographer Michael Jager of Austria on December 22, 2016.Ĭomet Honda-Mrkos-Pajdusakova was discovered long before I first observed it in 1974, and had been missed or very unfavorably placed for observation since its original discovery in 1948 by three comet hunters, M.Honda, A. With thoughts of its splendid 2016-2017 return as Comet 45PĪs Comet Honda-Mrkos-Pajdusakova (45P) streaks across our nighttime skies this winter, displaying a beautiful green coma and long linear tail several degrees to the northeast, I was inspired to go into the Arkansas Sky Observatories' Archives of bound research documents and find my records of observing this comet in 19. Memories of Comet Honda-Mrkos-Pajdusakova (1974-f)
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