A new comet has brightened to the point where it is visible in binoculars and should reach naked eye visibility at the end of this month. Comet LONEOS has already been spotted by several Irish observers, even from city lights, though it will be much better seen from dark rural skies. David Grennan has put up a webpage with details, star maps and an excellent video animation of the comet's path see www.astronomy.ie . We want you all to go outdoors every clear night for the rest of this month armed with this information and email us what you see at observe@astronomy.ie so we can report it in our next magazine www.astronomy.ie/sub .  

 

How bright will the comet get? Magnitude 3 perhaps (i.e.about as bright as the Andromeda Galaxy, but smaller and more compact and so even more visible?) but comets are notoriously difficult to predict and if this comet breaks up as some suggest then it could flare up even brighter. So please keep emailing us and tell us what you see...

 

There are lots of planets to see this month (Jupiter and Mars in evening skies, Venus and Saturn making that rare planetary alignment - see our magazine for details www.astronomy.ie/sub )

 

 

 

 

The I.S.S. is visible in evening skies once again (7:07pm tonight, Oct. 17) and you can see it every night until October 22nd.  Unusually, there are 6 astronauts on board as a new crew docked with I.S.S. last Friday after being launched by a Russian Soyuz craft. Three of the six will return in a Soyuz craft on Sunday (Oct. 21) so we may get to see it chasing I.S.S. across the sky in a rare space chase.

 

As usual we are issuing the very latest prediction and news of the "space chase" each afternoon on our long running Newsline, dial 1550-111-442 (calls cost 95c/min, or from U.K. dial 09001-88-19 50 calls cost 60p/min) or you can text the word "space" to 57003 and we'll send a reminder text 1 hour before I.S.S. flies over each evening (each text costs 1 euro). Proceeds from your calls help us promote astronomy remember.

 

See Astronomy Ireland's webpage about the International Space Station for more details at www.astronomy.ie/iss.html and please get all your friends out watching I.S.S. each evening.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Evening Classes:  You can still enrol at www.astronomy.ie/eveningclass.html until Oct. 18. More classes nationwide soon!

 

Public Lecture Nov. 12:  "Near Earth Asteroids"   We have received funding to bring in a U.K. speaker on Nov. 12 so please book places now:  www.astronomy.ie/lecture200711.html and find out why an asteroid may hit Earth in 2036!  If you're outside Dublin order the DVD of the lecture now at www.astronomy.ie/lectureDVD.html we go to great lengths to make sure everyone in Ireland can avail of these lectures at minimal cost so please use the DVD service