[IAUC] CBET 3016: 20120211 : COMET C/2012 C1 (McNAUGHT)

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                                                  Electronic Telegram No. 3016
Central Bureau for Astronomical Telegrams
INTERNATIONAL ASTRONOMICAL UNION
CBAT Director:  Daniel W. E. Green; Hoffman Lab 209; Harvard University;
 20 Oxford St.; Cambridge, MA  02138; U.S.A.
e-mail:  cbatiau en eps.harvard.edu (alternate cbat en iau.org)
URL http://www.cbat.eps.harvard.edu/index.html
Prepared using the Tamkin Foundation Computer Network


COMET C/2012 C1 (McNAUGHT)
     R. H. McNaught reports his discovery of a slightly diffuse comet with
diameter 10" on CCD images taken with the 0.5-m Uppsala Schmidt telescope at
Siding Spring (discovery observations tabulated below).  After posting on the
Minor Planet Center's NEOCP webpage, other CCD astrometrists have noted the
object's cometary appearance.  Giovanni Sostero (Povoletto, Italy) writes that
eight stacked 30-s R-band images taken remotely by N. Howes, E. Guido, and
himself on Feb. 6.4 UT with the 2.0-m "Faulkes Telescope South" at Siding
Spring show a coma about 5" in diameter with a weak central condensation,
adding that the coma is slightly elongated toward the southwest.  Forty
co-added 30-s images taken by R. Holmes, T. Linder, and V. Hoette with a
0.41-m f/11 Ritchey-Chretien reflector at Cerro Tololo on Feb. 10.0 show a
6".2-diameter coma with a faint, narrow tail 26".4 long in p.a. 36.7 deg.

     2012 UT             R.A. (2000) Decl.       Mag.   Observer
     Feb.  5.56391    6 24 34.98   -40 51 08.7   18.8   McNaught
           5.57468    6 24 34.33   -40 51 08.5            "
           5.58546    6 24 33.64   -40 51 07.0            "
           5.59617    6 24 32.90   -40 51 06.3            "

The available astrometry, the following preliminary parabolic orbital elements
by G. V. Williams, and an ephemeris appear on MPEC 2012-C38.

     T = 2013 Mar.  1.1677 TT         Peri. = 284.5924
                                      Node  = 299.7748  2000.0
     q = 4.629673 AU                  Incl. =  95.6793


NOTE: These 'Central Bureau Electronic Telegrams' are sometimes
      superseded by text appearing later in the printed IAU Circulars.

                         (C) Copyright 2012 CBAT
2012 February 11                 (CBET 3016)              Daniel W. E. Green