Comet C/2008 Q3 (Garradd) - now mag 7.5 and brightening

[starfinder]

I did a check just now on the BAA's Comet Section webpage to see what's up:
http://www.ast.cam.ac.uk/%7Ejds/

Seems there is now a comet at mag 7.5 and brightening: Comet C/2008 Q3 (Garradd).

It was discovered on August 27, 2008; discoverer G. J. Garradd (Siding Spring Survey).


Not bright enough now to get excited about I think, but definitely worth trying to spot if you are in a dark sky site. Or photographing from Singapore. Hopefully it will get much brighter as it approaches perihelion.

It's in the southern skies now (declination -67 deg) and poorly placed for Singapore (though visible), but the good news is that it is heading north, or should I say, "less south" declination-wise.

Perihelion on 23 June 2009, when it will be near Corvus and 63 degrees above the southern horizon in Singapore at 8pm and setting.

Right now, it transits at 1:46am on Sat morning 23 May, when it will be 21 degrees above the horizon almost exactly due south (azimuth 178 deg). It is now in the constellation Triangulum Australae. I can't remember the last time I saw anything in that constellation.


Here are the comet's orbital elements:
http://www.cfa.harvard.edu/iau/Ephemeri ... 008Q3.html

Its daily celestial coordinates:
http://www.cfa.harvard.edu/iau/Ephemeri ... 8Q3_1.html

And a constellation finder chart for the comet and a brightness prediction graph:
http://www.aerith.net/comet/catalog/2008Q3/2008Q3.html


Hope to be able to spot this visitor.