For the first time in nearly a week, this morning’s pre-dawn sky was clear and so I stepped outside, away from street lights and spotted Comet ISON. I used a pair of 10 x 50 binoculars, but there it was – a faint, diffused comet with a stubbly tail just above the eastern horizon tree line. The bright gibbous moon overhead didn’t help with observing, but it was still worth getting up for. And since I was already outside, I turned my binoculars on Jupiter and Mars, then the Orion Nebula, the Hyades star cluster and again back to Comet ISON just before dawn was braking.
There’s been a lot of mixed reviews recently about Comet ISON; how it was becoming a naked-eye object and then how it might not survive intact after its closest approach to the sun, or perihelion, on the 28th (Thanksgiving). If the comet breaks up as some predict it will, then this weekend, which is suppose to be clear, might be your last chance to see the comet. But then again, it still could become the comet of the decade late December. Fingers crossed.