Friday, November 28, 2014
Southern Skywatch has a New Home!
Southern Skywatch has a new home. http://www.users.on.net/~reynella/skywatch/ssky.htm
After 20 years with the same internet service provider I have moved to internode as my old provider is abandoning domestic customers. My contact details have also changed, naturally, but it will tale a little while to modify all the pages.
Unfortunately, due to what I thought was a technical glitch but was in fact my own stupidity, I was unable to set up a redirect at the original site before the old one disappeared.
Still, Southern Skywatch is back in action!
After 20 years with the same internet service provider I have moved to internode as my old provider is abandoning domestic customers. My contact details have also changed, naturally, but it will tale a little while to modify all the pages.
Unfortunately, due to what I thought was a technical glitch but was in fact my own stupidity, I was unable to set up a redirect at the original site before the old one disappeared.
Still, Southern Skywatch is back in action!
Labels: southern skywatch
Tuesday, November 25, 2014
The Sky This Week - Thursday November 27 to Thursday December 4
The Last Quarter Moon is Saturday November 29. Venus returns to the evening sky. Mars is easily visible
in the early evening. Jupiter is prominent in
the morning sky. Comet C/2102 K1 PanSTARRS is still visible in small telescopes in
the early evening.
The Last Quarter Moon is Saturday November 29. The Moon is at perigee, when it is closest to the Earth, on November the 28th.
Evening sky on Saturday November 29 looking west as seen from Adelaide at
21:00
(9:00 pm) ACDST in South Australia.
The Moon is close to Jupiter. Similar views will be seen elsewhere
at the equivalent local time (click to embiggen).
Venus is very difficult to see low on the western horizon in the twilight. At civil twilight, half an hour after sunset, it is a mere 3 finger-widths above the horizon. While Venus is bright it might be pssible to see not long after sunset, but you will need a flat, clear horizon like the ocean to see it.
Mars is easily seen in the western evening sky, setting just before midnight. Mars was at opposition, when it is biggest and brightest, on the 9th of April, and is still readily distinguishable as the bright red/orange object above the western horizon in the early evening.
Mars is still in the constellation of Sagittarius, but enters the constellation of Capricornius by the end of the week.
Morning sky on Sunday November 30 looking north as seen from
Adelaide
at 5:00 am ACDST. Jupiter is above the north-east horizon. (click
to embiggen).
Saturn is lost in the twilight.
Mercury is ilost in the twilight.
Jupiter rises higher in the morning sky, and now is easy to see above the horizon before twilight. Jupiter is the brightest object above the northern horizon. It is now not far from the bright star Regulus in the sickle of Leo (this forms the head of the constellation of the Lion).
It is now high enough for good telescopic observation before astronomical twilight.
Evening sky on Saturday November 29 looking south as seen from Adelaide at 21:00
(9:00 pm) ACDST in South Australia. Comet C/2012 K1 PanSTARRS above Achernar. Similar views will be seen elsewhere
at the equivalent local time (click to embiggen).
Comet C/2012 K1 PanSTARRS is visible in the evening sky from around 8 pm. With the Moon gone from the evening sky. It has now faded to where it is no longer visible in binoculars, but is still visible in even small amateur scopes under dark sky conditions.
At magnitude 8.0 you will need to let your eyes adapt to darkness to see the comet clearly.
There are lots of interesting things in the sky to view with a telescope. Especially with Mars prominent in the early evening sky. If you don't have a telescope, now is a good time to visit one of your local astronomical societies open nights or the local planetariums.
Printable PDF maps of the Eastern sky at 10 pm AEST, Western sky at 10 pm AEST. For further details and more information on what's up in the sky, see Southern Skywatch.
Cloud cover predictions can be found at SkippySky.
The Last Quarter Moon is Saturday November 29. The Moon is at perigee, when it is closest to the Earth, on November the 28th.
Venus is very difficult to see low on the western horizon in the twilight. At civil twilight, half an hour after sunset, it is a mere 3 finger-widths above the horizon. While Venus is bright it might be pssible to see not long after sunset, but you will need a flat, clear horizon like the ocean to see it.
Mars is easily seen in the western evening sky, setting just before midnight. Mars was at opposition, when it is biggest and brightest, on the 9th of April, and is still readily distinguishable as the bright red/orange object above the western horizon in the early evening.
Mars is still in the constellation of Sagittarius, but enters the constellation of Capricornius by the end of the week.
Saturn is lost in the twilight.
Mercury is ilost in the twilight.
Jupiter rises higher in the morning sky, and now is easy to see above the horizon before twilight. Jupiter is the brightest object above the northern horizon. It is now not far from the bright star Regulus in the sickle of Leo (this forms the head of the constellation of the Lion).
It is now high enough for good telescopic observation before astronomical twilight.
Comet C/2012 K1 PanSTARRS is visible in the evening sky from around 8 pm. With the Moon gone from the evening sky. It has now faded to where it is no longer visible in binoculars, but is still visible in even small amateur scopes under dark sky conditions.
At magnitude 8.0 you will need to let your eyes adapt to darkness to see the comet clearly.
There are lots of interesting things in the sky to view with a telescope. Especially with Mars prominent in the early evening sky. If you don't have a telescope, now is a good time to visit one of your local astronomical societies open nights or the local planetariums.
Printable PDF maps of the Eastern sky at 10 pm AEST, Western sky at 10 pm AEST. For further details and more information on what's up in the sky, see Southern Skywatch.
Cloud cover predictions can be found at SkippySky.
Labels: weekly sky
Wednesday, November 19, 2014
The Sky This Week - Thursday November 20 to Thursday November 27
The New Moon is Saturday November 22. Mars is easily visible
in the early evening and is visited by the crescent Moon on the 26th. Jupiter is prominent in
the morning sky. Comet C/2102 K1 PanSTARRS is visible in binoculars in
the early evening.
The New Moon is Saturday November 22.
Evening
sky on Wednesday November 26 looking west as seen from Adelaide at
21:00
(9:00 pm) ACDST in South Australia.
The Moon is close to Jupiter. Similar views will be seen elsewhere
at the equivalent local time (click to embiggen).
Venus is comes out the glare of the Sun by the end of the week, but will be very difficult to see low on the western horizon in the twilight.
Mars is easily seen in the western evening sky, setting around midnight. Mars was at opposition, when it is biggest and brightest, on the 9th of April, and is still readily distinguishable as the bright red/orange object above the western horizon in the early evening.
Mars is still in the constellation of Sagittarius, but is heading for Capricornius.
Morning sky on Saturday November 22 looking north-east as seen from
Adelaide
at 5:00 am ACDST. Jupiter is above the north-east horizon. (click
to embiggen).
Saturn is lost in the twilight.
Mercury is in the morning sky, but is too low for easy visibility.
Jupiter rises higher in the morning twilight, and now is easy to see above the horizon before twilight. Jupiter is the brightest object above the north-eastern horizon. It is now not far from the bright star Regulus in the sickle of Leo (this forms the head of the constellation of the Lion).
Evening sky on Saturday November 22 looking south as seen from Adelaide at 21:00
(9:00 pm) ACDST in South Australia. Comet C/2012 K1 PanSTARRS neaer Achernar. Similar views will be seen elsewhere
at the equivalent local time (click to embiggen).
Comet C/2012 K1 PanSTARRS is now visible in the evening sky from around 8 pm. With the Moon gone from the evening sky, under reasonably dark sky conditions it should be visible in 10x50 binoculars as a fuzzy dot.
At magnitude 7.7 you will need to let your eyes adapt to darkness to see the comet clearly. It doesn't have any spectacular encounters, but will look nice amongst the stars. While the comet is fading, and becoming more difficult to see in binoculars, it remains very easily visible n small telescopes.
More detailed charts and a printable binocular map are here.
There are lots of interesting things in the sky to view with a telescope. Especially with Mars prominent in the early evening sky. If you don't have a telescope, now is a good time to visit one of your local astronomical societies open nights or the local planetariums.
Printable PDF maps of the Eastern sky at 10 pm AEST, Western sky at 10 pm AEST. For further details and more information on what's up in the sky, see Southern Skywatch.
Cloud cover predictions can be found at SkippySky.
The New Moon is Saturday November 22.
Venus is comes out the glare of the Sun by the end of the week, but will be very difficult to see low on the western horizon in the twilight.
Mars is easily seen in the western evening sky, setting around midnight. Mars was at opposition, when it is biggest and brightest, on the 9th of April, and is still readily distinguishable as the bright red/orange object above the western horizon in the early evening.
Mars is still in the constellation of Sagittarius, but is heading for Capricornius.
Saturn is lost in the twilight.
Mercury is in the morning sky, but is too low for easy visibility.
Jupiter rises higher in the morning twilight, and now is easy to see above the horizon before twilight. Jupiter is the brightest object above the north-eastern horizon. It is now not far from the bright star Regulus in the sickle of Leo (this forms the head of the constellation of the Lion).
Comet C/2012 K1 PanSTARRS is now visible in the evening sky from around 8 pm. With the Moon gone from the evening sky, under reasonably dark sky conditions it should be visible in 10x50 binoculars as a fuzzy dot.
At magnitude 7.7 you will need to let your eyes adapt to darkness to see the comet clearly. It doesn't have any spectacular encounters, but will look nice amongst the stars. While the comet is fading, and becoming more difficult to see in binoculars, it remains very easily visible n small telescopes.
More detailed charts and a printable binocular map are here.
There are lots of interesting things in the sky to view with a telescope. Especially with Mars prominent in the early evening sky. If you don't have a telescope, now is a good time to visit one of your local astronomical societies open nights or the local planetariums.
Printable PDF maps of the Eastern sky at 10 pm AEST, Western sky at 10 pm AEST. For further details and more information on what's up in the sky, see Southern Skywatch.
Cloud cover predictions can be found at SkippySky.
Labels: weekly sky
Saturday, November 15, 2014
SmallestOne turns a prime number old
Thursday, November 13, 2014
Philae Made It! We have Landed ona a Comet!
After all the waiting and agonising, the Philae lander separated cleanly form Rosetta and made a slow, 7 hour journey to comet 67P.
And landed. Story here.
Wednesday, November 12, 2014
The Towering Cliffs of Comet 67P/Churyumov–Gerasimenko
 |  |
| Agilkia, the Philae landing site, looks pretty okay in this image (image credit ESA). Click to embiggen | But with a different lighting angle you can see it (indicated by box) is perched near a pretty worrying cliff. (image credit ESA). Click to embiggen |
Lighting angle can make a huge difference to how a place looks. With the lighting above, Philae's landing environs look relatively smooth, with some scalloping. With the light at a different angle, the "scalloping" is revealed as terrifying cliffs.
Labels: 67P, comet, spacecraft
Comet 67P/Churyumov–Gerasimenko in Celestia
As usual, I have been trying to make a Celestia file for comet 67P.
And failing miserably. I tried to convert the ESA public shape model to celestia 3Ds format and failed miserably. So I ended up using Jack Selden's Rosetta files, with a surface map taken from this thread on the Celestia. The Celestia comet looks nothing like the rubber duck shape of 67P, but until some kind person points me to a pubic Celestia shape model that is what I am stuck with.
I utterly failed to make any of the XYZ orbital files work for me, so I just copied the orbit of Dactyl around Ida. Yes, that's cheating, but after days of frustration I wanted something that works. If you want a stunning Celestia simulation, go here.
As usual, copy the code below and save as it as a text file 67P.ssc in the Celestia extras folder.
==========================67P.ssc=======================================
# Taken from Jack Seldens 67P ssc file
# Created By Ian Shazell, Spacecraft Analyst for Rosetta
# On Behalf of the European space Agency, www.esa.int
# Comet 67P Churyumov-Gerasimenko, Celestia SSC file. www.shatters.net/celestia
#
#
"Churyumov-Gerasimenko" "Sol"
{
Class "comet"
Mesh "asteroid.cms"
Texture "67p720x361.png" # texture from the Celestia forum from John Van Vliet
Radius 1.98 # http://forum.celestialmatters.org/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=690
EllipticalOrbit
{
Period 6.4451441700205338809034907597536
PericenterDistance 1.2431213
SemiMajorAxis 3.4632382
Eccentricity 0.6410523343769
Inclination 7.04073996
AscendingNode 50.150595169
ArgOfPericenter 12.77512076
MeanAnomaly -71.72623185
Epoch 2456778.5
}
Albedo 0.2
}
"Rosetta" "Sol/Churyumov-Gerasimenko"
{
Class "spacecraft"
Mesh "rosetta.3ds" # rosetta model http://homepage.eircom.net/~jackcelestia/files/rosetta.zip
Radius 0.005
EllipticalOrbit
{
Epoch 2449228.2028 # Using orbit of Dactyl around Ida
Period 0.96534 #
SemiMajorAxis 25.0 # Why? I can't make anything else work
Eccentricity 0.13 #
LongOfPericenter 310 #
AscendingNode 90 #
#
Inclination 8 #
}
Albedo 0.5
}
======================end 67P.ssc==========================
BREAKING NEWS! Philae Lives! (Philae heads towards comet 67P)
UPDATE 21:57 ACDST: Telemetry received shows flywheel working and Landing gear deployed. Everything appears to be working.
XKCD's wonderful cartoon of Philae leaving Rosetta and heading for comet 67P, the cartoon updates so every time you visit there will be a different image of the journey.
Philae has separated from Rosetta and is heading towards the comet.
Until the lander and Rosetta are lined up properly we won't have any telemetry, the first telemetry should be at 12:00 UT (that's 11 pm AEDST).
BREAKING NEWS! Telemetry acquired from@ESA_Rosetta and @Philae2014 !! WOOT!
The ony problem has been the nitrogen thruster that was supposed to hold the lander down as the harpoons and ice screws deployed has apparently failed. Unless the surface is rally solid, this should not be a problem. Everything else seems to be working fine.
The lander is heading towards Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko at a leisurely 2 Km per hour, it should arrive at the landing site in around 5 hours at 3:00 am AEDST (16:02 UT).
the Livestream is here http://new.livestream.com/ESA/cometlanding
XKCD's wonderful cartoon of Philae leaving Rosetta and heading for comet 67P, the cartoon updates so every time you visit there will be a different image of the journey.
Philae has separated from Rosetta and is heading towards the comet.
Until the lander and Rosetta are lined up properly we won't have any telemetry, the first telemetry should be at 12:00 UT (that's 11 pm AEDST).
BREAKING NEWS! Telemetry acquired from
The ony problem has been the nitrogen thruster that was supposed to hold the lander down as the harpoons and ice screws deployed has apparently failed. Unless the surface is rally solid, this should not be a problem. Everything else seems to be working fine.
The lander is heading towards Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko at a leisurely 2 Km per hour, it should arrive at the landing site in around 5 hours at 3:00 am AEDST (16:02 UT).
the Livestream is here http://new.livestream.com/ESA/cometlanding
Labels: 67P, comet, spacecraft
Tomorrow we Land on a Comet
 |  |  |
| Small bodies landed (or about to be landed on) by spacecraft. Asteroid Itokawa size 540m x 270m x 210m (image Credit JAXA) | Comet 67P size 4.1×4.5 Km (image credit ESA) | Asteroid Eros size 34.4×11.2×11.2 Km (image credit JPL/NASA) |
Tomorrow (Wednesday) at 04:03:20 UT, if all has gone well, the Philae lander will separate from the Rosetta spacecraft and begin its descent to Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko, by 16:02:20 UT Philae will have either landed on the comet, or crashed, or bounced off and gone spinning into space (for Australians, that is 3 pm Wednesday and 3 am Thursday). Either way this represents a remarkable achievement.
Humans have done some extraordinary things in space, we have landed a laser wielding, atomic powered robot on Mars with a sky crane, parachuted a probe into the freezing methane clouds of Titan, sent a probe ballooning in the searing hell that is Venus's atmosphere, but nothing compares to this.
Mars, Venus and Titan are all challenges on their own, but compared to comets they are staid. They orbit predictably, they rotate predictably, gravity is predictably down and we had a reasonably good idea of what their surfaces are like (well Titan was a gamble, the probe could have landed in one of the methane seas).
But comets are a different kettle of fish, while their orbits are more or less predicable (given that outgassing can push them off course), they tumble rather than rotate and they vent gas and small particles that can .. inconvenience .. a spacecraft in a rather terminal way.
Comet 67P is even more of a nightmare, instead of a sort of battered potato shape most people expected, it is like a rubber duck from the dungeon dimensions. Flat plains are interspersed with boulder fields, craters and towering cliffs. The concepts of up and down on this weirdly spinning object are more like an Escher drawing than our traditional concept of a planet or asteroid.
 |  |  |
| Asteroid Itokawa from 4.1 Km (image Credit JAXA) | Agilkia, landing site of Philae from around 10 Km (image credit ESA). Even the safe site is a lot more bramatic than the two asteroid we have visited. | Eros surface from around 10 Km (image credit JPL/NASA) |
While we have sent spacecraft scooting past comets before, even fired a copper slug into one, but we have never attempted to land on one. We have sort of landed on two asteroids. Itokawa, where the Hayabusa probe sort of bumped into it (and bounced off again with a precious dust sample) rather than landed per se, and Eros, where the Shoemaker orbiter wasn't actually designed to land but was rather crashed slowly on it. Itokawa is around 10 times smaller than 67P, and Eros 10 times larger, both giving entirely different challenges.
In contrast, Philae is designed to soft land and stay on the comet for months, taking measurements as the comet heats up. The descent will be slow, and it should touch down relatively softly, given the complicated calculations required to land the craft of the around 1 Km square patch of level surface Philae is aiming for, nestled in between boulders and scarps (and a rather dramatic cliff).
Unlike Itokawa and Eros, which had rather plain surfaces (even if scattered with alarming boulders), 67 P is a nightmare of chaos. Missing the landing site will be catastrophic.
If it succeeds in making it to the landing spot safely, Philae has a harpoon (a SPACE HARPOON!) to help anchor it to the surface as well as the equivalent of crampons on the lander feet.
The Agilkia site seems to be faily level, and covered with what looks like snow, but this is probably unconsolidated dust. What it is on top of nobody knows. While the comet has the overall density, and possibly the structural strength, of a snowbank, exactly how the material that makes up the comet, (rock, dust, ices, organic gunge) is organised is unclear.
Will there be a layer of rock cemented with ice, a layer of mostly ice, a messy honeycomb of rock and ice fragments with lots of space between? Will the dust layer be too deep and fragile for Philae to hold on to? Will the lander plummet into the surface like a rock thrown at a snowbank?
These are all questions that will be answered on the day. So until then we have to take a deep breath and wait. You can make a model of Rosetta while you wait.
You can watch the comet landing livestream here http://new.livestream.com/ESA/cometlanding
It will remain live until 19:00 UT (6 am Australian time).
In the meantime, you can watch this video of amateur images of 67P. http://vimeo.com/111177163
Labels: 67P, comet, spacecraft
Tuesday, November 11, 2014
The Sky This Week - Thursday November 13 to Thursday November 20
The Last Quarter Moon is Saturday November 15. The Moon is at apogee, its furthest from the Earth, at this time.
Mars is easily seen in the western evening sky, setting around midnight. Mars was at opposition, when it is biggest and brightest, on the 9th of April, and is still readily distinguishable as the bright red/orange object above the western horizon in the early evening.
Mars is still in the constellation of Sagittarius. At the beginning of the week Mars is close to the classic globular cluster M22. This will look rather nice in binoculars. As the week goes on Mars travels into less rich stellar fields, but is still nice in binoculars.
Saturn is lost in the twilight.
Mercury is in the morning sky, but is too low for easy visibility.
Venus is lost in the glare of the Sun.
Jupiter rises higher in the morning twilight, and now is easy to see above the horizon before twilight. Jupiter is the brightest object above the north-eastern horizon. It is now not far from the bright star Regulus in the sickle of Leo (this forms the head of the constellation of the Lion). On November 15 the Last Quarter Moon is near Jupiter.
At this time the Moon occults the star Subra. Subra (Omicron Leo) is a brightish white star visible to the unaided eye (magnitude 3.5). The occultation will be seen from Western Australia and Central Australia.
From Perth the star disappears behind the bright limb of the Moon at 2:48 AWST, and reappears from the dark limb at 3:31 AWST. From Hobart the star disappears behind the bright limb of the Moon at 3:54 ACST, and reappears from the dark limb at 5:29 ACST (in twilight). From Adelaide the star disappears behind the bright limb at 5:58 ACDST, this is quite deep in the twilight and so will be a bit tricky to see.
With the Moon at Last Quarter, this event is really best seen with binoculars or a small telescope (especially for the reappearance of the star in the twilight in Darwin and Adelaide). If you have a tripod or other stand for your binoculars, it will be much easier to observe. Set up about half an hour before the occultation to watch the star disappear (so you are not mucking around with equipment at the last moment).
Comet C/2012 K1 PanSTARRS is now visible in the evening sky from around 8 pm. With the Moon gone from the evening sky, under reasonably dark sky conditions it should be visible in 10x50 binoculars as a fuzzy dot.
At magnitude 7.5 you will need to let your eyes adapt to darkness to see the comet clearly. It doesn't have any spectacular encounters, but will look nice amongst the stars. On the 15th it is within binocular distance of the faint (magnitude 8.3) globular cluster NGC 1261. While the comet is fading, and becoming more difficult to see in binoculars, it remains very easily visible n small telescopes.
More detailed charts and a printable binocular map are here.
On the morning of Tuesday November 18 the Leonid Meteor shower peaks (from the point of view of Australians, that's 17 November UT), with the best time being between 3-4 am.
While the Leonids radiant is reasonably far from the crescent Moon, this is a bad Leonid year. Very few meteors will be visible (maybe one per hour). You can use the Meteor Flux Estimator to get a prediction for your location. Use the 13 Leonids option and don't forget to set the year to 2014.
There are lots of interesting things in the sky to view with a telescope. Especially with Mars prominent in the early evening sky. If you don't have a telescope, now is a good time to visit one of your local astronomical societies open nights or the local planetariums.
Printable PDF maps of the Eastern sky at 10 pm AEST, Western sky at 10 pm AEST. For further details and more information on what's up in the sky, see Southern Skywatch.
Cloud cover predictions can be found at SkippySky.
Labels: weekly sky
Tuesday, November 04, 2014
The Sky This Week - Thursday November 6 to Thursday November 13
The Full Moon is Friday November 7. Saturn is lost in the twilight. Mars is in the star clouds
of Sagittarius and is close to the globular cluster M22 on the 6th. Jupiter is prominent in
the morning sky. Comet C/212 K1 PanSTARRS is visible in binoculars
before midnight.
The Full Moon is Friday November 7.
Evening
sky on Thursday November 6 looking west as seen from Adelaide at
21:00
(9:00 pm) ACDST in South Australia. The inset shows the
approximate binocular view of Mars and M22 at this time.
Similar views will be seen elsewhere
at the equivalent local time (click to embiggen).
Mars is easily seen in the western evening sky, setting around midnight. Mars was at opposition, when it is biggest and brightest, on the 9th of April, and is still readily distinguishable as the bright red/orange object above the western horizon in the early evening.
Mars is in the constellation of Sagittarius and is close to the globular cluster M22 on the 6th. This will look rather nice in binoculars.
Saturn is lost in the twilight.
Morning sky on Sunday November 9 looking north-east as seen from
Adelaide
at 5:00 am ACDST. Jupiter is above the north-east horizon. (click
to embiggen).
Mercury is in the morning sky, but is too low for easy visibility.
Venus is lost in the glare of the Sun.
Jupiter rises higher in the morning twilight, and now is easy to see above the horizon before twilight. Jupiter is the brightest object above the north-eastern horizon. It is now not far from the bright star Regulus in the sickle of Leo (this forms the head of the constellation of the Lion).
Evening sky on Saturday November 8 looking south as seen from Adelaide at 21:00
(9:00 pm) ACDST in South Australia. Comet C/2012 K1 PanSTARRS is above Canopus. Similar views will be seen elsewhere
at the equivalent local time (click to embiggen).
Comet C/2012 K1 PanSTARRS is now visible in the evening sky from around 9 pm. While should be easily visible in 10x50 binoculars as a fuzzy dot, until the end of the week the waxing and Full Moon will make the comet very difficult to see.
At magnitude 7 you will need to let your eyes adapt to darkness to see the comet clearly. It doesn't have any spectacular encounters, but will look nice amongst the stars. On the 8th it is very close to the star alpha Doradus. Towards the end of the week the waning Moon rises later, and the early evening will be a good time to see the comet. .
More detailed charts and a printable binocular map are here.
There are lots of interesting things in the sky to view with a telescope. Especially with Mars prominent in the early evening sky. If you don't have a telescope, now is a good time to visit one of your local astronomical societies open nights or the local planetariums.
Printable PDF maps of the Eastern sky at 10 pm AEST, Western sky at 10 pm AEST. For further details and more information on what's up in the sky, see Southern Skywatch.
Cloud cover predictions can be found at SkippySky.
The Full Moon is Friday November 7.
Mars is easily seen in the western evening sky, setting around midnight. Mars was at opposition, when it is biggest and brightest, on the 9th of April, and is still readily distinguishable as the bright red/orange object above the western horizon in the early evening.
Mars is in the constellation of Sagittarius and is close to the globular cluster M22 on the 6th. This will look rather nice in binoculars.
Saturn is lost in the twilight.
Mercury is in the morning sky, but is too low for easy visibility.
Venus is lost in the glare of the Sun.
Jupiter rises higher in the morning twilight, and now is easy to see above the horizon before twilight. Jupiter is the brightest object above the north-eastern horizon. It is now not far from the bright star Regulus in the sickle of Leo (this forms the head of the constellation of the Lion).
Evening sky on Saturday November 8 looking south as seen from Adelaide at 21:00
(9:00 pm) ACDST in South Australia. Comet C/2012 K1 PanSTARRS is above Canopus. Similar views will be seen elsewhere
at the equivalent local time (click to embiggen).Comet C/2012 K1 PanSTARRS is now visible in the evening sky from around 9 pm. While should be easily visible in 10x50 binoculars as a fuzzy dot, until the end of the week the waxing and Full Moon will make the comet very difficult to see.
At magnitude 7 you will need to let your eyes adapt to darkness to see the comet clearly. It doesn't have any spectacular encounters, but will look nice amongst the stars. On the 8th it is very close to the star alpha Doradus. Towards the end of the week the waning Moon rises later, and the early evening will be a good time to see the comet. .
More detailed charts and a printable binocular map are here.
There are lots of interesting things in the sky to view with a telescope. Especially with Mars prominent in the early evening sky. If you don't have a telescope, now is a good time to visit one of your local astronomical societies open nights or the local planetariums.
Printable PDF maps of the Eastern sky at 10 pm AEST, Western sky at 10 pm AEST. For further details and more information on what's up in the sky, see Southern Skywatch.
Cloud cover predictions can be found at SkippySky.
Labels: weekly sky
Catch a Series of Bright International Space Station Passes (4-9 November 2014)
 |  |
| All sky chart showing local times from Heavens Above for Tuesday November 4 for Adelaide. | All sky chart showing local times from Heavens Above for Tuesday November 4 for Melbourne. |
 |  |
| The ISS passes above Mars, as seen from Adelaide on the evening of Tuesday November 4 at 21:13 ACDST. Simulated in Stellarium (the ISS will actually be a bright dot), click to embiggen. | The ISS passes near the Southern Cross, as seen from Melbourne on the evening of Tuesday November 4 at 21:44 AEDST. Simulated in Stellarium (the ISS will actually be a bright dot), click to embiggen. |
Starting tonight there are a series of bright evening passes of the International Space Station lasting for 5 days. For many places in Southern Australia this series has the ISS gliding either above or under Mars, depending on where you are, on Tuesday November 4. On the 5th there is a bright pass in the twilight close to the bright star Fomalhaut.
Some of the passes are very short although bright as the ISS enters Earth's shadow, but it is interesting to see the ISS wink out abruptly.
When and what you will see is VERY location dependent, so you need to use either Heavens Above or CalSky to get site specific predictions for your location (I'm using Melbourne and Adelaide and Perth as examples).
Start looking several minutes before the pass is going to start to get yourself oriented and your eyes dark adapted. Be patient, on the night there may be slight differences in the time of the ISS appearing due to orbit changes not picked up by the predictions. The ISS will be moving reasonably fast when it passes near Mars, so viewers should be alert as the ISS comes up from the horizon very quickly.
Labels: ISS, Satellite, unaided eye
Saturday, November 01, 2014
Southern Skywatch November, 2014 edition is now out!
The November edition of Southern Skywatch is now up. This month has a little bit of planetary action an occultation and a comet.
Jupiter rises higher in the morning twilight and is near the Moon on the 15th. There is a nice occultation visible from Central and Western Australia at this time.
Mars is obvious in the western evening sky. Mars is close to the globular clusters M28 and M22 early in the month (3rd and 6th respectively).
Saturn is lost in the twilight
Venus is lost in the twilight.
Mercury returns to the morning sky but is very difficult to see.
Comet C/2012 K1 graces our skies this month.
Mars is obvious in the western evening sky. Mars is close to the globular clusters M28 and M22 early in the month (3rd and 6th respectively).
Saturn is lost in the twilight
Venus is lost in the twilight.
Mercury returns to the morning sky but is very difficult to see.
Comet C/2012 K1 graces our skies this month.
Labels: southern skywatch
Click to read about or order
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