dipper@utastro.UUCP (Debbie Byrd) (11/15/85)
Comet Halley is now near something very easy to identify. We'll tell you about it -- after this. November 15 Halley Near the Pleiades This month, Comet Halley should be bright enough to see with binoculars. If you can find a star cluster called the Pleiades, you might be able to find the comet this weekend. Now, the comet won't flash across the sky, like a meteor. And you may not see any signs of its legendary comet tail. With binoculars, Halley should look like a ghostly ball set against the stars. Friday night, Comet Halley passes near something easy to find in the sky. It's about two degrees south of the Pleiades -- or Seven Sisters. This cluster of stars is in the constellation Taurus, the bull. It's shaped like a little dipper. The Pleiades cluster is pretty bright, distinctively small and misty-looking -- a tiny dipper overhead around midnight this week. If you can find the Pleiades star cluster -- and if you have a dark sky -- sweep near the cluster with binoculars for Comet Halley. It'll work best if you steady the binoculars on something -- a nearby wall, or a car, or sit down and prop them up on your knees. Comet Halley is now just two days away from its opposition to the sun, when we pass between it and the sun. the comet is up all night now -- highest at midnight. It's still traveling toward the sun -- and will be closest to Earth later this month -- when it passes within about 60 million miles. It's possible that Comet Halley will become faintly visible to the eye sometime around New Year's. Script by Deborah Byrd. (c) Copyright 1984, 1985 McDonald Observatory, University of Texas at Austin