Electronic Telegram No. 3420
Central Bureau for Astronomical Telegrams
INTERNATIONAL ASTRONOMICAL UNION
CBAT Director:  Daniel W. E. Green; Hoffman Lab 209; Harvard University;
 20 Oxford St.; Cambridge, MA  02138; U.S.A.
e-mail:  cbatiau@eps.harvard.edu (alternate cbat@iau.org)
URL http://www.cbat.eps.harvard.edu/index.html
Prepared using the Tamkin Foundation Computer Network


COMET C/2013 D1 (HOLVORCEM)
     Paulo Holvorcem and Michael Schwartz report the discovery by Holvorcem of
a comet with a hint of diffuseness and a short tail roughly toward p.a. 300
degrees on three 150-s unfiltered exposures taken with the 0.41-m Tenagra III
astrograph (located near Nogales, AZ, U.S.A.) between Feb. 17.31 and 17.35 UT.
Three co-added follow-up 300-s unfiltered exposures taken between Feb. 18.42
and 18.46 with the same telescope in good seeing (FWHM 3".6) show a central
condensation about 8" in diameter and a broad 12" tail toward p.a. 300 deg.
Three 300-s additional exposures taken with the same instrument between Feb.
19.41 and 19.45 show a 10" tail toward p.a. 310 deg.  The available astrometry
supplied by Holvorcem is given below.

     2013 UT             R.A. (2000) Decl.       Mag.
     Feb. 16.31405   11 42 40.00   -11 44 24.6   19.2
          16.32815   11 42 39.81   -11 44 29.1   19.3
          16.34884   11 42 39.55   -11 44 35.3   19.0
          17.31721   11 42 27.92   -11 50 05.7   19.7
          17.33102   11 42 27.70   -11 50 10.3   19.6
          17.34582   11 42 27.55   -11 50 15.5   19.4
          18.42152   11 42 13.11   -11 56 10.1   19.2
          18.43856   11 42 12.87   -11 56 15.6   19.3
          18.45562   11 42 12.62   -11 56 21.1   19.3

The following preliminary elliptical orbital elements by G. V. Williams
from the above observations, along with an ephemeris, appear on MPEC
2013-D41.

     T = 2013 Apr. 26.6217 TT         Peri. = 256.8586
     e = 0.792023                     Node  = 295.1823  2000.0
     q = 2.452620 AU                  Incl. =  10.1592
       a = 11.792730 AU    n = 0.0243379    P =  40.5 years


NOTE: These 'Central Bureau Electronic Telegrams' are sometimes
      superseded by text appearing later in the printed IAU Circulars.

                         (C) Copyright 2013 CBAT
2013 February 20                 (CBET 3420)              Daniel W. E. Green