Astroblog: Thursday July 20 to Thursday July 27

Tuesday, July 18, 2023

Thursday July 20 to Thursday July 27

The First Quarter Moon is Wednesday, July 26. Saturn is now rising around 8:30 pm local time. Jupiter is prominent in the morning sky. Venus is prominent from the evening twilight to early evening. Telescopically Venus rapidly increases in size and its crescent thins. On the 20th the thin crescent Moon forms an attractive pattern with Mercury Venus, Mars and the star Regulus. on the 21st the moon is close to Mars making a nice lineup with the bright planets. On the 26th, Mercury,Venus and the star Regulus make a triangle. From the 27th to 28th Venus and Mercury are close.

The First Quarter Moon is Wednesday, July 26.

Evening sky on Saturday, July 22 as seen from Adelaide at 23:00 ACST, Saturn is well above the eastern horizon. The inset is the telescopic view of Saturn at this time.

Similar views will be seen from the rest of Australia at the equivalent local time.

Morning sky on Saturday, July 22 as seen from Adelaide at 05:49 ACST, (90 minutes before sunrise, click to embiggen). Jupiter is above the horizon near the Hyades and Pleiades. The inset is the telescopic view of Jupiter at this time.

Similar views will be seen from the rest of Australia at the equivalent local time (90 minutes before sunrise).

Evening sky on Friday, July 21 as seen from Adelaide at 18:24 ACST, 60 minutes after sunset (click to embiggen). Venus, Mars and the bright star Regulus are roughly equidistant wit Mercury below. The Moon forms a line with the bright planets. The inset is the telescopic view of Venus at this time.

Similar views will be seen from the rest of Australia at the equivalent local time (60 minutes after sunset).

Evening sky on Wednesday, July 26 as seen from Adelaide at 18:27 ACST, 60 minutes after sunset (click to embiggen). Venus, Mercury and Regulus make an attractive triangle, with Mars above. The insets are the telescopic views of Venus and Mercury at this time.

Similar views will be seen from the rest of Australia at the equivalent local time (60 minutes after sunset).

Whole sky on Saturday, July 15 as seen from Adelaide at 18:55 ACST, 90 minutes after sunset (click to embiggen). Mars is visible above the north western horizon above the bright star Regulus and Venus is just below.

Scorpius is readily visible in in the east.

Between the bright star Canopus and the Southern Cross are another wealth of binocular objects to discover. With the Moon just waxing it will be an excellent time to see them.

Elsewhere in Australia will see a similar view at the equivalent time (90 minutes after sunset).

Mercury climbs higher in the evening twilight and is close to the thin crescent Moon on the 19th. You will need a level, unobscured horizon to see see them at their best.

Venus is coming close to the bright star Regulus. On the 15^th Venus, Regulus and Mars make an attractive line up with Venus and Mars almost equidistant from Regulus. Venus is at its closest to Regulus on on the 18th.

Mars is leaving Regulus and Venus behind. On the 15^th Venus, Regulus and Mars make an attractive line up with Venus and Mars almost equidistant from Regulus.

Jupiter is prominent in the morning sky.

Saturn climbs higher in the morning skies and is rising around 8:30 pm local time.

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