A question Regarding Elinin and Google Sky

[Docwalker]

Hi SG's

A debate is raging on a site I frequent about Elinin and possible object being hidden from the public on Google Sky

So regarding the said Comet or mystery object on Google Sky what are your thoughts and as I live in Wales and all I get is cloud do any of us have images taken from this chunk of sky that are up to date?

Your input and wisdom .....and clear sky is needed

[labr@t]

what are the coordinates

[RogerTheDodger]

at a wild guess, 5h 53m 27s,-6deg 10' 56...

[brianb]

The thing is still about mag. 18 ...

[labr@t]

at a wild guess, 5h 53m 27s,-6deg 10' 56...

Doh, I can see it now.

[Docwalker]

I think its Orions Belt?....I live in Swansea so the weather has been so tragic...........

Any pictures would be a bonus up to date live as opposed to the Stellarium or Google shots, I just wish these damb clouds would go away for a month.

[acey]

It's predicted to become bright (possibly naked eye) in autumn. I don't know where Google Sky got its data but I assume it doesn't constantly update its image library by superimposing comets etc - it hasn't got some kind of live camera on the sky. And as has been said, the comet is currently about mag 18.

I've seen various loony sites getting excited about Elenin, conspiracies, Mayan end-of-world scenarios etc etc. I guess we can expect a lot more of that as the year goes on.

Some links here:

http://stargazerslounge.com/observing-deep-sky/130726-question-about-comet-elenin.html

http://stargazerslounge.com/space-news/123043-comet-elenin-something-look-forward-next-year.html

[Docwalker]

Thankyou for the information that is just what I needed...about Elenin that is thankyou. People saying it was due closeby on March 15th I have now put them straight.

Now I just have to pray to the Rain Gods of Wales for a clear nights to view Orion for a week or so.

[Jethroshotgun]

I have some questions about Comet Elenin (C/2010 X1). I have heard all kinds of things about this object and I am looking for some good answers. Youtube has reported things like, Elenin= Extinction level event 9 and that Elenin is actually Ophichus 13 a brown dwarf. I have also heard that this object will start affecting the Earth as early as 3-4-2011. Please help me to understand the truth about this because there are lots of scary things on youtube and I want to protect my family.

[brianb]

It's a perfectly ordinary comet, not even a big one, whose orbit brings it fairly close to the earth later in the year, but nothing at all to worry about - it will miss by many times the distance of the moon & is nowhere near big enough to cause any damage, unless it was actually going to hiyt the earth, and even then the consequences would be regional rather than global.

[Jethroshotgun]

Why is that area of Google sky blacked out? can anyone post a picture of this area?

[brianb]

Why is that area of Google sky blacked out?

It isn't, that's a myth ... fact of the matter is, the comet isn't on the GS images because it's far too faint (around mag. 18)

For sensible information on this comet, try the following authoritative sources:

C/2010 X1 ( Elenin )

Sky and Telescope

[Jethroshotgun]

Brian, with all do respect it is not a myth!! if you go to (5h 53m 27s,-6 10' 56) there is a big blacked out rectangle there. Can you explain why they would do this?

[brianb]

Can you explain why they would do this?

Forgot to take the image? As though deliberately removing the data from this section would stop anyone else from looking .... hell, there are lots of respectable conspiracy theories around (like the fossil fuel companies trying to debunk climate change), but this one really does take the biscuit. There are some right nutters out there, not all wearing ecclesiastical garb.

[Jethroshotgun]

They must have forgot to take the picture over Area 51 too....

[Ant]

What this area51...?

A screen grab from Google maps - a few seconds ago!

Ant

[acey]

The position of the comet today (3 March 2011) is

RA 11 46 41.6

Dec +00 03 00

Its estimated magnitude is 14.9. The position and predicted magnitudes for subsequent dates can be found here:

Elements and Ephemeris for C/2010 X1 (Elenin)

I've had a look at Google Sky and nothing is blacked out at today's position. Nor is there any comet, of course, because the picture was taken a few years ago by the Sloan Digital Sky Survey.

http://www.google.com/sky/about.html#sources

http://www.sdss.org/

There is however a bright star in the field which I take to be GS0027200193, having checked with the Guide Star Catalogue

ESO/ST-ECF Online HST Guide Star Catalogue

I've also checked up on the "black box" on Google Sky (which is nowhere near the past, present or future position of the comet). For quite a while it has been giving excitement to the Niburu/Planet X/2012 brigade. For example there was a question about it (posted 2 years ago) on Yahoo Answers

http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20090113063301AA6zyRo

One response quotes NASA scientist David Morrison, who talks about Niburu etc here:

http://astrobiology.nasa.gov/ask-an-astrobiologist/intro/nibiru-and-doomsday-2012-questions-and-answers

On his page, David Morrison responds to various questions, including the following:

7. Can you explain the fact that the area at (5h 53m 27s, -6 10’ 58”) has been blackened out in Google Sky and Microsoft Telescope? People suggest that these have been blackened out because those are the co-ordinates where Nibiru is located at present.

Morrison replies:

Several people have asked me about this blank rectangle in Orion in Google Sky, which is a presentation of images from the Sloan Digital Survey. This can’t be a “hiding place” for Nibiru, since it is a part of the sky that could be seen from almost everywhere on the Earth in the winter of 2007-08 when much of the talk about Nibiru began. That would contradict the claims that Nibiru was hiding behind the Sun or that it could be seen only from the southern hemisphere. But I too was curious about this blank rectangle, so I asked a friend who is a senior scientist at Google. He replied that he “found out that the missing data is due to a processing error in the image stitching program we use to display the Sloan survey images. The team assures me that in the next run through, this will be fixed!”