As promised I've processed all the latest observations, converted them to TA format and sent them off to Guy for publication in TA.

The VEM and visual magnitudes seem to give a consistent light curve for 2021 A1 since the comet was discovered in January.  The light curve continues to suggest that the comet will peak at around 4th magnitude, possibly appearing a little brighter to the naked eye.  It should be possible for UK observers to follow it fairly easily until December 11/12.  The absolute magnitude is around 8, which is about average, however any comet can fragment, sometimes catastrophically.  I am not making any prediction as to the likelihood of such an event for this comet.

I've also updated the visual observations web page, including light curves for this comet, along with 19P (could reach 9th mag), 67P (now fading from 9th mag) and 2017 K2.  This last is currently appearing brighter than the mean curve, so could do better than the currently predicted 7th mag.

Regards,

Jonathan Shanklin
BAA Comet Section visual observations co-ordinator
https://www.ast.cam.ac.uk/~jds/

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