Monday, November 09, 2020
Thursday November 12 to Thursday November 19
The New Moon is Sunday November 15. The Moon is at perigee, when it is closest to the Earth, on the 14th.
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.
Adelaide.
Three bright planets are visible stretching west to east. Jupiter, Saturn and Mars. The Moon joins the lineup later this week.
Similar views will be seen
elsewhere at the equivalent local time (90 minutes after sunset). click to embiggen.
The inset is the telescopic view of Venus at this time.
For this years Leonids the New Moon gives good viewing conditions. As for the recent past years this year there are low rates, you will be unlikely to see anything substantial (although there may be short bursts of higher rates). The best time to observe in Australia is the morning of the 17th and 18th between 3 and 4 am (daylight saving time). The Radiant (where the meteors appear to come from) is in the Sickle of Leo, see the map to the left. Orion and the Hyades will be visible. So it will be a quite nice morning, even if there are only a few meteors (possibly no more than one every half hour).
Mercury is lost in the twilight.
Venus is still readily visible low above the horizon in the morning. It is close to the thin crescent Moon on the 13th.
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 under a hand-span apart at the beginning of the week but slowly draw closer. The pair are prominent in the evening skies along with Mars. On the 19th the crescent Moon is close to Jupiter forming a triangle with Saturn.
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/
Labels: weekly sky
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