Abstract
A COMET of about the seventh magnitude was discovered during the evening of February 27 at the position R.A. Oh 35-3m: Dec. 19° 22′ N. (at 18h 25.1m U.T.). It was first reported to the Central Bureau at Copenhagen by Prof. A. Wilk of the Cracow Observatory, Poland, but apparently the comet was discovered almost simultaneously by observers elsewhere. From observations made since February 27 at Warsaw, Meudon, Copenhagen, in England and elsewhere, two preliminary orbits have been computed, but the one given by Whipple and Cunning-ham of the Harvard College Observatory appears to fit the observations the better. The elements of this orbit give the date of perihelion as 1937 Feb. 21.73 U.T. and perihelion distance as 0-620 (o> = 32° 9′: H = 57 ° 3′: i = 25 ° 57′). Thus during the present week the comet is receding from the sun, but its distance from the earth is decreasing. In consequence its brightness has remained nearly stationary, though possibly it may reach a maximum about March 13 or 14; although the comet is not a naked-eye object, it should be within the range of binoculars. On February 27, the comet was near the borders of the constellations of Pisces and Andromeda; since then it has been traversing the latter constellation, being near the bright star p Andromedae in the evening of March 10; the comet's path, continued through Perseus, will have entered Cassiopeia on March 24. In Great Britain the comet has been photographed two or three times by Mr. G. F. Kellaway of Yeovil, Somerset; a short tail to the nucleus is shown on the photographs. Dr. A. C. D. Crommelin thinks that it is worth while to examine the possibility of identity of the present comet with that of the comets of 1532 and 1661.
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A New Comet. Nature 139, 441–442 (1937). https://doi.org/10.1038/139441f0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/139441f0