It look’s like those of us who were hoping Comet Elenin would be a great comet will be disappointed. New updates indicated this comet will be more like Comet Hartley 2. This means seeing the comet will require binoculars and a dark sky. The IAU (International Astronomical Union) is still predicting the comet may brighten to be naked eye visible in dark skies, but still not bright enough to be easily seen in metropolitan areas.
As I stated in my previous article predicting how bright comets will be is notoriously inaccurate. The comet is still far enough away that things could change, but as the comet gets closer the likelihood of change falls off dramatically. Additionally the comet is now predicted to be at its brightest when it's behind the Sun. In the ten days it will take before we can see the comet come from behind the Sun it may dim considerably.
Right now there is nothing absolutely certain about the comet’s orbit. We do know its orbit is very eccentric which gives it an orbit in the hundreds of thousands of years. At one time the comet’s orbit was believed to be hyperbolic meaning the comet would past the Sun never to return.
Astronomers will learn much more about the comet in the next few months. Maybe we will luck out with a comet we can see with our eyes. You can follow the Elenin’s orbit here. If you want to follow brightness predictions you can go to Seiichi Yoshida’s excellent web site and scroll down to the Magnitudes Graph. The smaller the magnitude number the better. A 6 on the scale is needed for a comet to just be barely seen in dark skies, a 3 is needed for suburban areas. The smaller the number, the better. Comet McNaught was a minus 6!
I will keep you posted on any changes and I still have my fingers crossed, because comets can be very fickle.
Wishing you clear skies
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