alle@ihuxb.UUCP (10/12/83)
Pasadena, Calif. [AP] - Halley's Comet will be five to six times brighter
than previously predicted when it swings by Earth again in 1986, two
researchers say.
Charles S. Morris and John G. Bortle said at a recent cometary
astronomy conference at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory that previous
brightness calculations were inaccurate because they were based on
observations from 1910, the last time the comet streaked through the
solar [sic] system on its 76-year orbit.
Scientists initially thought Halley's [comet] would be barely
visible to the naked eye, but Morris and Bortle predict it could be
as bright as Polaris, the star that marks magnetic north.
Astronomers who tracked Halley's [comet] in 1910 weren't as expert
in the technicalities fo celestial observation, particularly measuring
light, and modern astronomers who used their data didn't consider those
limits.
Halley's will pass inside Pluto's orbit in late 1985, pass closest
to the sun on Feb. 9, 1986 and should remain visible through April, 1986,
when it heads back into the stars for another 76 years.
*************************************
>From the Chicago Tribune - October 9, 1983.
Allen England at AT&T Bell Laboratories, Naperville, IL
ihnp4!ihuxb!alle REM%MIT-MC@sri-unix.UUCP (10/20/83)
From: Robert Elton Maas <REM @ MIT-MC> I could quibble with you on one of your points. Halley's comet isn't streaking, it's just drifting, most of the time. Only when it gets near the Sun and is traveling very rapidly could it be referred to as "streaking". The rest of the time it's just running or crawling or sitting [sorry, couldn't resist private TENEX joke]. Thus the AP may be sort of correct in saying the comet streaks through the solar system every so often, although I agree it would have been more correct if it had said it streaks through the INNER solar system every so often.