By JULIE VARUGHESE, Staff writer Friday, November 2, 2007
That isn't a star you're seeing.
The Comet Holmes - which is about halfway up in the northeast sky near the stars of the constellation Perseus - is shining 400,000 times brighter than usual.
By 2 a.m. Saturday morning, it is expected to be directly overhead.
By dawn, it will be in the northwest part of the sky.
The comet is expected to be visible until mid-November, when the evening moonlight returns, according to http://www.skyandtelescope.com.
The comet, named for the man who discovered it in 1892, usually appears this time of year. It doesn't have a tail that most people associate with comets.
But what makes its appearance unusual this time around is that it is coming from a different part of the sky than it usually does.
How does the average person tell if they are seeing the comet?
"It's easiest when you know constellations - aside from that, it's fuzzy," said Janie Schwab, executive director of the Dudley Observatory in Schenectady. "It sort of looks like a star, but its fuzzy."
The bottom line?
"Stars twinkle and comets don't," she said. "Planets don't twinkle either."
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