New Comet Visible in Early Morning Sky

[Mike]

A recently discovered comet is surprising skywatchers by becoming brighter than predictions had first suggested and can now be seen with the unaided eye during the next few weeks. 

Comet McNaught, officially catalogued as C/2009 R1, was discovered by Australian astronomer Robert McNaught last September using the using the 0.5-meter Uppsala Schmidt telescope and a CCD camera. It's the 51st comet that bears McNaught's name.

Although initially an extremely faint object, enough observations of the newfound comet were made to allow Brian Marsden of the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory in Cambridge, Mass., to calculate an orbit. 

More.......

http://www.space.com/spacewatch/new-comet-mcnaught-visible-100608.html

[Carole]

As this is the 51st McNaught comet, I take it this is not the same one that we saw 3 years ago.  How confusing to have the same name, you would think they would number it 51 McNaught to differentiate.

Carole

[Rick]

The confusion's being caused by sloppy reporting. The comet should be referred to as "C/2009 R1 (McNaught)". Silly thing is the reporter mentions the "C/2009 R1" bit, but tags it on in a way that implies you don't really need to know it...