Comet C/2013 US10 Catalina & 47-Tucanae

With the Moon now absent during the evening at last, I had a go at finding Comet Catalina, at about 50 degrees altitude in the Southern constellation of Indus.

I intended obtaining long exposures using my Vixen Polarie tracking mount but with a 200mm lens attached I found I had a mechanical issue preventing the camera from aiming higher than about 40  degrees. So I ended up taking a series of shorter shots without the Polarie tracker.

Catalina had a 5′ coma and a 10′ tail and seemed about magnitude +7. It is predicted to brighten and will reach perihelion in November 2015.

2015-08-06 Comet C2013 US10 Catalina 60x8sec 200mm f2-8 ISO2000

While the camera was in high ISO mode searching for Catalina, I took this shot of a few million stars in globular cluster 47-Tucanae, 16,700 light years away, magnitude +4.9:

2015-08-06 47-Tucanae 5x5sec 200mm- f2-8 ISO 6400

---

All images © R.Powell

---