Comets

When I was a senior in high school, one of the science news stories that occasionally appeared in the media, always buried under mountains of Watergate items, was the discovery and impending passing-by of the purportedly spectacular Comet Kohoutek, only a short time before discovered by a Czech astronomer. Comets bright enough to be visible to the naked eye, we were told, were exceedingly rare, and the only one that had been expected in the foreseeable future was Halley's in 1986. So there was a lot of hype going on about Kohoutek in 1973. My high school astronomy club even got hold of a good telescope that they used to go out into the local community and offer public viewing. But to the unaided eye, when this comet actually came, it was barely visible, and in urban settings, invisible. The aftermath saw Comet Kohoutek treated as a letdown, an act that fizzled like a fireworks display full of duds. So comet fever disappeared as the population turned away from the sky and got more into themselves during the 70's "me" decade.

Now let's fast-forward a little to late in 1975, when reports began to surface that a newly discovered comet, named Comet West, was going to be visible early the following year. Not surprisingly, no one seemed interested. But I was. In March, 1976, anyone who just walked outside a little before sunrise and looked eastward a few degrees above the treetops would have seen Comet West streaking across the sky! It looked as if someone had taken a very thick stick of chalk and smeared the sky with it. However, even though this show was spectacular, it went almost ignored in the media.

I had thought from much earlier on in my life that Halley's Comet would have looked like that display presented by Comet West. Ironically, when it did show up in late 1985 through early 1986, Halley's "bombed" (for its visual effect) just as Kohoutek twelve years earlier. In late 1985, I was able, though, to cross the street from my apartment each evening where a big field was (since then plugged up with a Wal-Mart and a Lowe's) and, with the help of my binoculars and my Field Guide to the Stars, locate and plot Halley's Comet's path through the constellations Aquarius and Pisces. But it was nothing compared to Comet West. To this day I have yet to speak to anyone outside my family who knows what I am talking about when I mention Comet West, a most spectacular comet!

A comet of this visual impact wouldn't appear again until 1996-1997, when we were greeted with the presence of two of them: Comets Hyakutake and Hale-Bopp. An amateur astronomer took a photograph of the latter during its approach that showed a common optical photographic effect of lines jutting sideways from a background star. I had seen this effect many times in the past and knew it for what it was. But some opportunistic people in the media who should have known better allowed the disinformation to be broadcast that this was an alien craft. And the leader of an insulated west-coast cult named Heaven's Gate took this as the sign that a spaceship was going to take them up. The cult members committed mass suicide because they thought it would release themselves from their bodies to join up with their alien buddies. Later, the involved media figures all made out like they were being unfairly targeted for criticism for promoting the asinine Hale-Bopp spaceship notion that led to this tragedy.

Earlier this year, for Southern hemisphere observers, Comet McNaught lit up the night sky. It earlier had a brief time of visibility in the Northern hemisphere as well, but I missed it. I think sometimes the simple day-to-day exigencies of living cause me to miss opportunities for experiences (like seeing comets) that could have enriched my life more. Since astronomy is an interest of mine, a little more consistent attention given to magazines like Sky and Telescope and Astronomy (or finding a dependable astronomy website) seems to be a awfully good idea! After all, you can't always depend on the general media to get you the information you're looking for in a timely and accurate manner.