Comet C/2022 E3 ZTF is in sight

January 7, 2023: Comet C/2022 E3 ZTF is in sight.

Comet C/2022 E3 (ZTF) was discovered on March 2, 2022 by the Zwicky Transient Facility, a new wide-field camera installed on the ancient Samuel Oschin Telescope at the Mount Palomar Observatory. It will be closest to the Sun, at 166 million km anyway, in 5 days.

From January 13 it will be visible all night and will be very high in the morning sky in a sky without an annoying Moon until the third week of January. Its apparent displacement in the sky will accelerate to reach 13 times the apparent diameter of the Moon in 24 hours on February 1 when it passes closest to the Earth at a distance of 42 million km.

At that time it will be at its best and the most optimistic forecasts announce it at the limit of visibility to the naked eye in the countryside. It will then be necessary to play with the Moon which will be back but the comet will be very high in the middle of the night.

On January 30 around midnight it will be regarding 10° above and a little to the right of the North Star: a simple way to find it, preferably with a pair of binoculars. The detail of its visibility is accessible from the address www.astrosurf.com/obscf/