The San Francisco Amateurs' public comet viewing Friday night was a great success. Not realizing the long lead times demanded by local media, I got something of a late start with publicity. Our public service announcement was not carried until the day of the event, and then only by the San Francisco Independent, the Progress, and two radio stations. This limited publicity and word-of-mouth still reached far enough to bring about 300 people to the site at Lands' End at some time during the program. They were met there by about 25 members of the SFAA, who brought twelve scopes ranging from a homemade 80mm refractor to a 12" LX200 and a 16" Dobsonian.

After a greeting by NPS Ranger Bob Holloway, the evening began with a brief presentation of comet facts by yours truly, of which the best thing to be said may be that I did not physically trip over my tongue. Actually, I learned a lot in preparing my notes for the talk, and enjoyed the experience overall. Thanks must go out to people like Bill Arnett, Russell Sipe, Gary Kronk, the fellow behind the Comet Observation Home Page, and others who make great resources available over the net. I couldn't have done it without them.

First sighting of Hale-Bopp was made at 6:59 in bright twilight, and by 7:20 people were lining up to view the spectacular visitor at a variety of magnifications in several scopes. I ran my 8" dob at 50x for a wide-field view that revealed the "hoods" about the coma to the sharp-eyed, while still showing almost a degree of tail. The 12" Meade next to me was working at much higher power for a detailed view of the coma and hood structure. There were also plenty of binoculars present and in use, including a pair of 25x100s that gave a great view of the tail. It was a great opportunity to view the comet from varying perspectives. My favorite view was actually with the naked eye, as I was able to see the dust tail curve gracefully above Gamma Andromeda with a spiky hint of the ion tail trailing almost due north. The comet has dimmed very slightly from last week, but is still a startling naked-eye sight.

I was happy to see many children at the event, and to see that they were enjoying themselves greatly. Though the site was not as dark or high as our usual one on Mt. Tam, the location on a major San Francisco Muni bus line made it possible for many people who might not have made the trip to a darker site to attend, and get a very nice view of Hale-Bopp and some other wonders of the sky. I was also pleased that the vast majority of questions posed by the public were thoughtful and rational; no one seemed to give much thought to the psuedoscientific baggage that comets seem to carry.

By about 8:30 the comet had begun to sink into a light mist that was running through the Golden Gate, and scopes began to turn elsewhere. Mars proved inscrutable due to poor seeing, which I am beginning to think is typical of the site, but spectators were impressed by M42 in Orion, M35 in Gemini, the Pleiades, and the Double Cluster in Perseus, among others.

At 9:30 the public crowd had thinned, and members began to pack up for the evening. We had to save some energy for New Moon Saturday star parties tonight! Counting the crowd was difficult, as many of the public came and left throughout the evening, but estimates by the Park Service and some of our members put attendance around 300. A great start for what we all hope will be a strong relationship between the Rangers of the Golden Gate National Recreation Area and the San Francisco Amateurs, with more public viewing events in the future!