Across the world, both amateur and professional astronomers are observing Comet Lovejoy, which is steadily getting brighter. Here in Illinois, Jeffrey Madura has shared a remarkable moment captured on video.
On the evening of New Year’s at 9:45 PM Central Standard Time, while Mr. Madura had his Canon XA10 camera trained on the comet, a small smudge near the center of the picture, a satellite passed through the field of view from right to left and crossed the comet.
He posted his video to Youtube; I learned about it from the mailing list of a local astronomy club, the Naperville Astronomical Association, of which both Jeffrey and I are members.
Comet Lovejoy, C/2014 Q2, is expected to become a fourth-magnitude object in a couple of weeks, meaning that it can be spotted by naked-eye observers in a dark sky, or easily captured in binoculars.
