Running Jacques !!!

* Object Name: C/2014 E2 (Jacques)
* Object Type: comet
* Location: Castres (Tarn – France) N43.35 E2.14
* Date: August 27th 2014 21h35 to 22h55 UT
* Media: pencil HB + 2B, white drawing paper, scanned + inverted & colorized with PhotoPaint

Conditions: humidity 80%, 18°C, no wind.
Excellent transparency and pretty good seing
No Moon
Equipment:
– Dobson Orion XT12 (300 x 1500mm => F/D 5)
– Eyepiece Televue Panoptic 15mm (mag x 100)
– no filter

While watching at this nice comet, close to Cephei, I got stunned seing the velociy of this object.
After only 5 minutes, I could notice a change in it’s location at only x100 magnification.
So I decided to take my scratchbook to report its moving path during a couple of hours.

There was no visible tail, I just could detect a slight dissimetry on the coma.
I was stargazing in (small) town, in my garden, with some lights around, so this was not the best condition.
The nucleus is not so bright as last Lovejoy’s one, and the green colour is fainter than the representation I made (just a little cheat:)
The magnitude is difficult to estimate on these objects, but I guess it was about 7 or better.

The comet was on Aug. 27th the closest from earth (about 0,56UA) and it is also reaching these days it’s peak of activity.

NOTE : On Aug 31th 0:00 to 2:00 don’t miss the conjunction with Mu Cephei (the beautiful Herschel’s Garnet Star) even maybe an occultation by the comet!

Thanks for your interest.
Jean-Marc Saliou
APAM astroclub – France

Webmaster’s note: ASOD viewers have probably noticed that Comet Jacques has been the focus of the last few days. This reflects the great number of excellent sketches submitted of this comet.