December 3, 2020 – ALPO Comet News for December 2020
November turned out to be a great month for comet observers with 101 magnitude estimates of 9 comets and 44 images of 10 comets being submitted to the Comets Section. C/2020 S3 (Erasmus) led the pack as it brightened to 6th magnitude. C/2020 M3 (ATLAS), 156P/Russell-LINEAR and 88P/Howell were also visible between 7th and 10th magnitude. This month, Erasmus will be too close to the Sun for ground-based observers. As is fitting for 2020, we will be able to follow Erasmus virtually in images taken by the SOHO and STEREO spacecraft. C/2020 M3, 156P, and 88P will be fading but still bright enough for small aperture observers. For those willing to try fainter objects, 11P/Tempel-Swift-LINEAR, 29P/Schwassmann-Wachmann, 141P/Machholz, 398P/Boattini, and disintegrating C/2020 P1 (NEOWISE) will be between 10th and 14th magnitude.
The monthly ALPO Comet News PDF can be found here. Note with all of the recent comet activity, this report is a bit large in size. A shorter version of this report is posted on a dedicated Cloudy Nights forum. All are encouraged to join the discussion over at Cloudy Nights.
- Carl Hergenrother
