Chasing The Dawn With Comet Leonard
C/2021 A1 Leonard. I sure felt a lot of uncertainty driving into the snow early on the morning of December 3. I left the house at 3am and couldn’t have my brights on as the light bouncing off all the blowing snow was too distracting. Still, I had faith that the weather radar would prove to be accurate enough and pushed on. I took a short nap in my car once I arrived on location at 5 am. I thought at the very least I would shoot the foreground for later use and it couldn’t be much worse than when I got there. 20 minutes later and it was clearing up nicely.
Leonard is no Neowise, so this is a focal length blend to emphasize the comet. Leonard can be seen passing by Messier 3, a star cluster containing more than 500,000 stars. The sky is a tracked image at 200mm, and 35mm for the foreground.
Rinse and repeat. I had taken the morning off work following the previous image. I had a few errands to run after work and then once again went to bed by 7pm. Waking up at 1 in the morning, I set off to meet some friends in the Pembina Valley to take another shot at the comet. In this photo, you can see Messier 3 again just left of top centre. You can also see the snowglobe star cluster near the edge of the frame to the left of Comet Leonard.
Currently Comet Leonard can be see in the early morning pre-dawn hours rising into the eastern sky just below the Big Dipper. Leonard is expect to peak on December 12. After that, the comet will hug the western horizon just after sunset until it fades from view. You would need a camera, telescope, or binoculars to see Leonard.