Is anyone planning on seeing the comet in the next few days? It will be brightest on the night of the 12th and the morning of the 13th.
I'm planning on standing on one of the Merrimack River bridges in Lawrence at 4:45 PM (11 minutes after sunset) on January 13. It will be only 3 degrees above the horizon at that time, which is why I need a clear view on the bridge. I have about 10 minutes after that before it hits 1° above the horizon where it will disappear below the spot I'm standing. It will be at the exact azimuth that the sun is (243°, i.e. 27 degrees south of west), but only by coincidence, as this is not the case one day earlier or later. The magnitude will be -0.80 (1.4 times as bright as Mercury but 1.7 times dimmer than Mars).
These numbers above vary based on location. The link below is configured for the time I'm going to see it but not the location; you can change both yourself. For those not familiar with astronomy, negative magnitudes are brighter; decreasing the number by 1 makes it 2.5 times as bright. You might also want to look at times before sunrise in addition to after sunset.
https://theskylive.com/planetarium?objects=sun-moon-c2024g3-mercury-venus-mars-jupiter-saturn-uranus-neptune-pluto&obj=c2024g3&h=21&m=45&date=2025-01-13
To determine how many degrees above the horizon a specific spot in Street View is:
1. Find the spot you want. Look at the URL. 42.7037561,-71.1605312,3a,75y,243.84h,85.17t shows latitude, longitude, not sure what 3a is, "75y" is 75° FOV (not important here), 243.84 degrees azimuth (you want to match this with the direction the comet is in), 85.17° up from the bottom.
2. While not zoomed in, move the viewer up or down so that "85.17t" shows a number fairly close to 90.
3. Put your cursor on the lowest point where you can see the sky and zoom in. This will make the number more accurate, but since you can't zoom in infinitely, it won't be perfect. Try to find the number so that zooming in on the horizon won't change it.
4. Once you have that number, it's below the horizon if the number is below 90 and above the horizon if the number is above 90. For example, the spot I have is 91, which means it's 1 degree above the horizon, and since the comet will be 3 degrees above, I can see it.
After a certain amount of use or time (about three minutes of constant use in my experience), the URL bar might stop updating. Reloading the page will fix this until it happens again.
Going to be very hard to see in the Northern Hemisphere. Don't go blind by its proximity to the Sun.
Probably not; though an afternoon appointment on Monday means I'll actually be home and not commuting at 4:45, I don't have a good view that low to the horizon near my apartment.
It was too cloudy, so I didn't try.