did every body get to see the haleys comet a few years back?how many seen it lain and what did you think?

Question

the goomer.what did it look like was happenning fron your part of the world , .from my part it sort of looked like a lot of stars shooting out of a tunnelof stars.what kind of outer space excitement is next ?i would like to know before it happens.be prepared

Answer 1

The last pass of Haley's comet in the 1980s turned out to be kind of a dud. If you saw Hale-Bopp in 1997, you saw the brightest comet in the last century.

Answer 2

I was in Arizona during the last pass in 1986. My father came for a visit specifically to find a dark area to observe the comet.

After dark one night, we drove down to the southern end of the Huachuca mountains, near the border with Mexico, to an overlook I'd found. Halley's Comet was a disappointment at that time -- sort of a blurry blue-white smudge on the sky. After about an hour there, we headed back home to Sierra Vista, disappointed.

For some reason, I woke up at about 3AM that same night, and looked out the back window of my house. Halley's was brighter then, so I woke my dad and we spent about an hour in my back yard observing. It was better than before, but still a disappointment. There have been several since that were much more spectacular.

Answer 3

I observed Haley's Comet in Jaunuary, 1986 from a location at about 42.5 degrees north latitude in Upstate NY. The time of day was approx. 9:00 PM. The comet appeared very near the southwestern horizon and was very faint and unspectacular as I viewed it in my small 3" refractor telescope.

I also observed the Hale-Bopp comet from the same location in April, 1997. That comet was high in the northwestern sky at about 80 degrees above the horizon and put on a terrific show for about a week. I used nothing but my naked eye to observe it.

Answer 4

I saw the comet in the late winter of 1986. It was faint, and easily overlooked. I don't know when, in 2051 it is supposed to return, nor where in the sky. If you think you saw stars shooting out of a tunnel of stars you are quite mistaken; the comet does not seem to change as you watch it over a short period of time.

Answer 5

I got to see it. It was neat and strange looking, like the strong wind blowing the top off a snowcone. A lucky few will see it twice in a lifetime.