Comet Pan-STARRS

Last night I set out for Doughton Park on the Blue Ridge Parkway.  I was looking for a good place to get an unobstructed view of the western sky(this is somewhat difficult in my area).  Just south of Doughton Park, I found an acceptable spot to sit and wait for Comet Pan-STARRS to show up. 

I arrived about 30 minutes before sunset, and once the sun actually set, my eyes were peeled looking for the comet. 

After waiting about 25 minutes after sunset, I started to get frustrated with not being able to see it.  I even googled how to see it(luckily I had data service), and space.com stated that the comet would be visible just to the left of the crescent moon(at this point I couldn't even see the moon).

...A few minutes later...  Boom, there's the moon, a tiny crescent almost perfectly following the sun.  But still no comet.... So I waited... and waited... and waited... and then I got really frustrated because the wind was howling and I was starting to feel like this whole night would be time spent in vain(even though shots with crescent moons are nice by themselves).

I looked again at where space.com said to look, and took a photo of the general vicinity using my 70-200mm lens.  Then upon viewing the image... there it was.  I tiny little streak in the sky right where it was supposed to be.  It was so small that it was very hard to spot with the naked eye even after finding out exactly where it was.

After I got home and loaded the images on the computer, I noticed that Comet Pan-STARRS was visible WELL before I noticed it on the back of my camera.  It was visible while the moon was much higher in the sky!(and I didn't have a clue)  To see a couple more images click here to go to Smugmug

Oh well.... Enjoy...



Comet Pan-STARRS near a setting crescent moon backed by a rich pre-twilight sky.