Two comets for the price of one?

[rwilkinson]

This weekend there will be a "conjunction" of two comets: 260P/McNaught and C/2018 N2 (ASASSN) in the constellation of Aries. At their closest (during the afternoon of the 7th) they appear within 10 arc-minutes of each other, but they remain within half a degree through the previous and following nights.
This graphic from the C2A program shows their trajectories:

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Unfortunately they are not very bright (only around 11th magnitude), so the best time to look out for them will be after the Moon sets, in the pre-dawn hours.

[rwilkinson]

I've just got an image from an iTelescope in New Mexico:

Comets 260P & 2018 N2 from iTelescope T5. 3x 120s with 250mm f/3.4.

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260P is the one near the centre of this field.
This time I was operating the telescope "live", rather than waiting to get the data back from a pre-submitted job.

[rwilkinson]

Last night for once, whilst it was cloudy in Spain and New Mexico, the skies were clear in Bolton!
So I set up a little imaging system pointing through an upstairs window, to catch the comets as they cleared the tall trees in the Park:

The two comets from Bolton in the early hours of 8-Sep. 35x 120s with 200mm telephoto lens on Hx916 camera

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