Great Balls of Fire

You’ve probably never seen an exploding comet. Well you can now, right from your own back yard. A dim comet called Comet 17P/Holmes was being watched by astronomers when suddenly it exploded a few days ago. It’s now visible with the naked eye. I was able to see it the last few nights in the constellation Perseus that is in the northeastern sky right after it gets dark (sky map here). It looks like a fuzzy star but look at it with some binoculars or a home telescope and it becomes obvious it’s no ordinary star (pictures here).