HOWARD HOCHHALTER: Discover the movie stars of the night sky heraldtribune.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from heraldtribune.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
Stelliferous: March skies will have a great show for amateur astronomers
Howard Hochhalter
Early March’s pre-dawn sky will give us a show worth getting up early for, as Mercury, Jupiter, Saturn and the moon perform a celestial hoedown, all four objects neatly lined up on the ecliptic.
The ecliptic, by the way, is the imaginary line that represents the apparent path of the sun across the sky.
Here are the key dates for the show (all times are 6 a.m.):
March 1: Mercury (shining at near 0.0 magnitude), Jupiter (-2.0 magnitude) and Saturn (+0.7 magnitude) are bunched up together in the eastern sky, with Jupiter 2.5 degrees east of Mercury, and Mercury 6 degrees east of Saturn. (The width of your fist, with the back of your hand facing you, held a full arm’s length from your face, is 10 degrees; the width of your little finger is 1 degree.)
Bishop Museum of Science and Nature holds watch party for NASA s Mars landing abcactionnews.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from abcactionnews.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
Howard Hochhalter
Ah, winter in Southwest Florida – the season of cooler temperatures, lower humidity, and fewer mosquitoes.
To these seasonal pleasures, astronomers add clearer night skies and the constellation Orion the Hunter, which appears high in the eastern sky after sunset at this time of year and slowly slides westward throughout the night.
This is the silver dollar of the sky, the superstar of constellations. It has something for everyone. For me, after 15 years as an astronomer, Orion is still unbelievable.
But why do astronomers get so stoked when they think about being able to watch a single constellation for hours on end? Here are a few reasons:
Jupiter & Saturn will appear as one giant planet in the nighttime sky on December 21st known as âThe Great Conjunctionâ
Itâs been nearly 800 years since the alignment occurred at night Great Conjunction By Noel Rehm | December 18, 2020 at 7:54 PM EST - Updated December 18 at 7:54 PM
SARASOTA, Fla. (WWSB) -
Thereâs no question: What happens in the sky the night of the winter solstice is sure to bring some joy in a year when itâs been hard to find. Jupiter and Saturn will dance in a planetary conjunction, lining up perfectly to create the illusion of a âChristmas star.â