Photographer Alan Dyer observes Comet NEOWISE (C/2020 F3) with binoculars on the dark moonless night … [+] of July 14/15, 2020 from Dinosaur Provincial Park, Alberta. (Photo by: Alan Dyer/VW PICS/Universal Images Group via Getty Images)
It’s been a few months since the so-called “green comet” and a few years since Comet NEOWISE, but it now seems that the newly found Comet Nishimura could be visible to the naked eye at night during Sept. 2023.
Officially called C/2023 P1 (Nishimura), the comet was discovered very close to the sun on Aug. 11, 2023 by Hideo Nishimura, an amateur astronomer in Japan, according to Starwalk, and confirmed by the Minor Planet Center on Aug. 15.
When And Where To See Comet Nishimuri
Although it’s currently not bright enough to see with anything other that a large telescope, Comet Nishimura is predicted to become bright enough around Sept. 11, 2023 while it’s in the constellation Leo. It will be close to the crescent moon and Venus, according to EarthSky.
At around magnitude 5 it will be right on the cusp of naked eye visibility—largely because comets are diffuse objects, unlike stars—so observers would be wise to also have binoculars or a telescope on hand.
Visible To The Naked Eye
However, it will reach its closest to the sun a week later in the constellation Virgo, when it could get as bright as magnitude 3.2, according to Starwalk. That would make it easily visible to the naked eye.
The bad news is that Leo will only be visible in the night sky a few hours before dawn above the eastern horizon. Comets also have a habit of defying predictions, either brightening, dimming or even falling apart unexpectedly.
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Next Bright Comet In 2024
Then next bright comet after Comet Nishimuri is expected to be comet C/2023 A3 (Tsuchinshan-ATLAS)—better known as A3—a long-period comet with an orbit of just over 80,000 years.
Now in the inner solar system, it comes from the Oort Cloud—a sphere around our solar system that’s home to millions of comets—and will make its closest approach to the Sun on Oct. 10, 2024.
It should be visible from the northern hemisphere in the southwest just after sunset, possibly as bright as Venus.
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Meet Comet Pons-Brooks
Comet 12P/Pons-Brooks—a giant comet the size of Halley’s comet—will slide closest to the Sun on Apr. 21, 2024 and making its closest approach to Earth on Jun. 2, 2024.
A comet that orbits the Sun every 71 years, 12P/Pons–Brooks was first spotted in 1812. It was recently revealed to be on course to be visible during the next total solar eclipse in North America on Apr. 8, 2024.
This is also a big year for the “mother of all comets.” Last seen in the inner solar system in 1986, on Dec. 9, 2023, Halley’s comet will get as far as it ever does from the Sun—about 35 Earth-Sun distances past the orbit of Neptune—and begin to drift back towards the inner solar system. It’s expected to be bright in Earth’s sky next in the summer of 2061.
Wishing you clear skies and wide eyes.
