Hale-Bopp Finding Chart for 30th March 1997

View from Armagh looking towards the North-West at 10.00 p.m. on 30th March 1997. The comet is best seen with binoculars, but viewed with the naked eye both the head and tail should be easily visible. To get your bearings, note the bright star Capella, in the constellation of Auriga high in the west, the prominent "W" of stars that make up the constellation of Cassiopeia, and the outline of Perseus. The comet passes close to the Andromeda Nebula (marked on the map as M31), which is a spiral galaxy rather like our own, with the distinction of being the furtherest object visible with the naked eye. It lies at a distance of 2,200,000 light years from the Earth. The map also shows the position of the Pleiades cluster, a group of newly formed stars in our own Galaxy. Viewed with the naked eye the Pleiades cluster appears as a haze of stars.

Last Revised: 06/02/1997 WWW contact: webmaster@star.arm.ac.uk

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