Central Bureau for Astronomical Telegrams

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IAUC 8914: COMET P/2007 VQ_11 (CATALINA); C/2007 U5, C/2007 U6; 17P

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IAUC number 

                                                  Circular No. 8914
Central Bureau for Astronomical Telegrams
INTERNATIONAL ASTRONOMICAL UNION
Mailstop 18, Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory, Cambridge, MA 02138, U.S.A.
IAUSUBS@CFA.HARVARD.EDU or FAX 617-495-7231 (subscriptions)
CBAT@CFA.HARVARD.EDU (science)
URL http://www.cfa.harvard.edu/iau/cbat.html  ISSN 0081-0304
Phone 617-495-7440/7244/7444 (for emergency use only)


COMET P/2007 VQ_11 (CATALINA)
     A slightly diffuse object found by A. Boattini on Catalina
images taken on 2008 Feb. 1.1 UT was posted on the Minor Planet
Center's 'NEOCP' webpage.  J. Young (Table Mountain 0.61-m
Cassegrain reflector) confirmed the object on CCD images from Feb.
1.2 UT as having a very diffuse, round, 8" coma with no tail
visible in fair seeing with light cirrus clouds.  T. Spahr then
identified this object with several observations from 2007 Nov. and
Dec., including an apparently asteroidal object discovered by the
Catalina Sky Survey on Nov. 3 (discovery observation tabulated
below) that had been designated 2007 VQ_11 after being linked to
observations made on Nov. 6 at the Xu-Yi station of Purple Mountain
Observatory (cf. MPS 225184).

     2007 UT             R.A. (2000) Decl.       Mag.
     Nov.  3.42085    4 11 40.45   + 3 21 51.5   18.8

The new astrometry, the following orbital elements, and an
ephemeris appear on MPEC 2008-C02.

                    Epoch = 2008 Feb. 24.0 TT
     T = 2008 Feb. 13.5568 TT         Peri. = 277.6529
     e = 0.502035                     Node  = 164.0574  2000.0
     q = 2.693808 AU                  Incl. =  12.3249
       a =  5.409639 AU    n = 0.0783342    P =  12.582 years


COMETS C/2007 U5 AND C/2007 U6 (SOHO)
     Further to IAUC 8912, additional Kreutz-sungrazing comets have
been found on SOHO website images, as tabulated below.  C/2007 U5
appeared stellar (mag about 7.5) in C3 images, and was slightly
diffuse with no tail in C2 images.  C/2007 U6 was very faint (mag
about 8) and quite diffuse.

 Comet       2007 UT       R.A.(2000)Decl.   Inst.  F    MPEC
 C/2007 U5   Oct. 24.488   13 45.8  -13 04   C3/2   MU   2008-A51
 C/2007 U6        24.729   13 49.2  -12 55   C2     AK   2008-A51


COMET 17P/HOLMES
     Corrigendum.  Regarding the gas-expansion velocity reported on
IAUC 8891, the correct value is about 1.0 km/s, further confirmed
using the CS(3-2) line.

                      (C) Copyright 2008 CBAT
2008 February 1                (8914)            Daniel W. E. Green

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