Ison: The comet of the century - on 3rd December

I remember when I was little and Haley's comet was coming round. "A once in a lifetime event" and all that. The relentless news articles got my dad all excited weeks in advance. He got me excited about it, and then the big event happened. It came within visual range. A tiny little star in the sky. I even had a telescope at the time, actually I've still got that same telescope, it does upto 50x magnification. I used it to get a better look at Haley's comet. At full magnification that tiny little star in the sky became a pronounced straight line smudge. I must admit that even at the time I took more satisfaction from the knowledge that I'd be able to tell people that I saw it than I did from actually seeing it.

Nowadays I'm far more impressed by mankind's ventures into space. Some blokes are on the edge of their seat with heart racing while watching a bunch of blokes kicking a ball about. I was like that watching the 'live' documentary about the Cassini-Huygens successful landing. That was a true once in a lifetime event. A man made object being landed successfully on a moon in the outer solar system. That was a first. Or a man made object actually leaving the solar system and still functioning as it did so. Or devising technology and witchery needed to find actual planets outside of our solar system. These things are so monumentally profound. It makes me wonder what else we'll figure out, discover and achieve in my lifetime, and what sort of monumental achievements my sons or their kids will hear about.

But anyway, sorry, I digress. So the comet melted eh?

 

We do have Haleys comet coming soon ( 50 years ) , it comes round every 76 years . Shiney has seen it at least a dozen times

 

Brilliant I suppose it won't be as visible but still a chance of a glimpse