Abstract
COMET GALE.—Mr, Walter F. Gale, the discoverer of comets 1894 II. and 1912 II., has sent particulars of the discovery of comet 1927f. He was sweeping the neighbourhood of Theta Piscis Australis with a Zeiss binocular just after midnight on June 7, and picked up a small faint nebulosity, the cometary character of which was quickly verified with his telescope. Ho obtained approximate positions on the next, three nights (incidentally these positions suggest that Prof. Gomiessiat's observation of June 10 was inadvertently telegraphed half a degree too far north); these, together with a rough position on June 25 by Mr. Townsend at Hawera, New Zealand, afford material for an approximate orbit, which Dr. A. C. D. Crommelin has deduced as follows: T: 1927 June 14.30 U.T.; ω: 212° 35′; Ω: 66° 38′; i: 12° 40′, log q 0.1030. The small value of i suggests the possibility that the orbit may be periodic. The distance from the earth at discovery was 0.43 astr; units. The comet still remains too far south for convenient observation in England. Some observations were made at the Cape, which have been sent to the I.A.U. Bureau at Copenhagen. It is noteworthy that three of the four unexpected comets discovered this year are due to British observers, as is also the detection of Comet Grigg-Skjellerup on its return.
Article PDF
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Our Astronomical Column. Nature 120, 344 (1927). https://doi.org/10.1038/120344a0
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/120344a0