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Monday, November 30, 2020

 

Thursday December 3 to Thursday December 10

The Last Quarter Moon is Tuesday December 9. The bright planet Venus is low in the twilight morning skies.  Three bright planets dominate the evening sky with Mars, Jupiter and Saturn making the evening skies stunning. Jupiter and Saturn move closer together ahead of their awesome conjunction later this month.

The Last Quarter Moon is Tuesday December 9.

Evening sky at 22:03 ACDST (90 minutes after sunset) on Saturday, December 5 facing west as seen
from Adelaide. The pair of Jupiter and Saturn are above the western horizon.  The pair are visibly closer now, heading for their spectacular meeting later this month.

 The insets show the telescopic views of Jupiter and Saturn at the same magnification at this time.

Similar views will be seen elsewhere in Australia at the equivalent local time (90 minutes after sunset), click to embiggen.

Whole sky at 22:03 ACDST  (90 minutes after sunset), on
Saturday, December 5 as seen from
Adelaide.


Three bright planets are visible stretching west to east. Jupiter, Saturn and Mars.

 Similar views will be seen elsewhere at the equivalent local time (90 minutes after sunset). click to embiggen.


Evening sky at 22:03 ACDST  (90 minutes after sunset) on  Saturday, December 5 facing north as seen from Adelaide. Mars is above the northern horizon near the variable star Mira (indicated by the circle). Mars is past opposition, but is still excellent. more details here

The inset shows the telescopic view of Mars at this time. Similar views will be seen elsewhere in Australia at the equivalent local time (90 minutes after sunset), click to embiggen.
 
 
 

Morning sky on Saturday, December 5 showing the eastern sky as seen from Adelaide at 5:05 am ACDST (45 minutes before sunrise). Venus is getting lower to the horizon. The comet C/2020 S3 Erasmus is visible in binoculars near Venus.

The left inset is the telescopic view of Venus at this time.

 
 Similar views will be seen elsewhere in Australia at the equivalent local time (45 minutes before sunrise), click to embiggen.


Mercury is lost in the twilight.

Venus is still visible low above the horizon in the morning

Mars is readily visible in the evening sky above the north -eastern horizon in the early evening. Mars is close to the variable star Mira, which is still reasonably bright. Mars was at opposition, when it is biggest and brightest as seen from Earth, on October the 14th, but is still worthwhile observing. Observing details and more at the Mars Opposition site.
  
Jupiter can be readily seen in the early evening sky in the west. Jupiter and Saturn start out two finger-widths apart at the beginning of the week but slowly draw closer heading for their spectacular meeting later this month. The pair are prominent in the early evening skies along with Mars.
 
 Saturn too is visible in the early evening skies in the west and is also still an excellent sight.
 
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.




Star Map via Virtual sky. Use your mouse to scroll around and press 8 when your pointer is in the map to set to the current time.

Cloud cover predictions can be found at SkippySky.

Here is the near-real time satellite view of the clouds (day and night) http://satview.bom.gov.au/

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