Tuesday, October 1, 2013

New Comet: P/2013 R3 (CATALINA-PANSTARRS)

Cbet nr. 3658, issued on 2013, September 27, announces the independent discoveries of a new comet (discovery magnitude ~18.0) by the Catalina Sky Survey's 0.68-m Schmidt telescope (with no mention of the appearance of the object; observer R. E. Hill) and by Bryce Bolin, Jan Kleyna, Larry Denneau, and Richard Wainscoat from images obtained with the 1.8-m Pan-STARRS1 telescope on Haleakala. Bolin et al. wrote that the discovery images show two distinct nuclear components separated by approximately 3" towards a position angle of 240 degrees, and a diffuse tail that extends for approximately 14" towards p.a. 240 degrees.

The new comet has been designated P/2013 R3 (CATALINA-PANSTARRS).

We performed follow-up measurements of this object on September 28, 2013.  Below you can see our image of this comet, stacking of 20 unfiltered exposures, 120-sec each, obtained remotely from MPC code H06 (iTelescope Observatory, New Mexico) on 2013, September 28.3, through a 0.43-m f/6.8 astrograph + CCD + f/4.5 focal reducer. Click on it for a bigger version.


M.P.E.C. 2013-S53 assigns the following preliminary elliptical orbital elements to comet P/2013 R3: T 2013 July 21.48; e= 0.29; Peri. = 2.83; q = 2.12;  Incl.= 0.85

by Ernesto Guido & Nick Howes

No comments: