Comet Ikeya-Zhang with Andromeda Galaxy

April 4, 2002, 8:01pm MST

On this night the comet appeared just above the Great Galaxy in Andromeda (M31). The galaxy can be seen just below the head of the comet; it appears as a faint smudge, but is actually a collection of hundreds of billions of stars!

Date: April 4, 2002
Time: 8:01pm MST
Location: West of Lake Pleasant, Arizona
Camera: Olympus OM-1 on homemade tracking mount
Film: Kodak Elite Chrome 400 slide (pushed one stop)
Focal length: 100 mm (cropped slightly)
Aperture: f/2.8
Exposure time: 2 minutes
Scanned with Nikon Coolscan LS-10E