Dear Friends of Lookout Observatory,

My wife Anitra and I were at Lookout Observatory this morning (July 11), and we got up at 3:30AM to see Comet Neowise (Otherwise known as C/2020 F3). We set up chairs in the meadow and had cameras ready. From the time the comet rose in the Northeast above the distant trees just as early dawn was starting to the time when the brightening sky made the comet disappear seemed amazingly short. Anitra saw the comet first just peeking above the trees, and about half an hour later, after fussing with the camera to get it in focus with the right exposure, I got our best picture, attached below. As the comet faded in the brightening dawn, we heard a rooster crow, then a pack of coyotes squealing and howling for a couple of minutes over by the reservoir, then a surround sound of barking neighborhood dogs, and then silence except for the wakening birds. It was a lovely country morning, and we wanted to share with you an image of the brightest comet to come around in years.

Technical Data: Canon EOS Rebel XS camera, 200mm f/2.8 lens wide open, ISO1600, 1 sec. Exposure, July 11, 2020, 4:28 am PDT, Lookout, CA. Image cropped to about 85% of original.

Keep looking up,

Carter Mehl, (sometime) Resident Astronomer,

Lookout Observatory