Thursday August 15 to Thursday August 22

The Full Moon is Tuesday, August 20. Mercury is lost in the twilight.Venus climbs higher in the evening twilight.  Saturn enters the evening sky around 8:00 pm, and is now a decent telescopic object in the late evening. The Moon is close to Saturn on the 21st. Mars and Jupiter start the week spectacularly close on the 15th, and then draw apart but remain close for the rest of the week.

The Full Moon is Tuesday, August 20.  the Moon is at perigee, when it is closest the Earth, on the 21st.

Western evening sky on Saturday, August 17 as seen from Adelaide at 18:42 ACST (60 minutes after sunset, click to embiggen).   

Mercury is no longer visible. Venus is readily visible now and climbing higher in the twilight.

 

 

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

 

The eastern sky at 22:00 ACST Wednesday, August 21 with Saturn now reasonably high above the horizon for viewing. Saturn is near the just past full Moon.

 

The inset shows the telescopic view at the time. (click to embiggen).

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

Morning sky on Thursday, August 15 as seen from Adelaide at 06:00 ACST (60 minutes before sunrise), Mars and Jupiter are spectacularly close below the red star Aldebaran. 

 

The inset is the low power telescope view of the pair at this time.

 

 

Similar views will be seen from the rest of Australia at roughly the equivalent local time (60 minutes before sunrise).

 

Whole sky on Saturday, August 17 as seen from Adelaide at 19:11 ACST, 90 minutes after sunset (click to embiggen).

Scorpius is at the zenith with the heart of the milky way below it. The Southern Cross is still prominent in the Southern sky. Between the bright star Canopus and the Southern Cross are a wealth of binocular objects to discover. The fainter clusters will will be hard to see as the Moon is full.

 

 

   

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

 

 

Mercury is lost in the twilight.

Venus climbs higher in the evening twilight and is readily visible in the evening twilight.

Mars is rising in the morning sky and starts the week spectacularly close to Jupiter on the 15th.Then the pair separate.

Jupiter is rising in the the morning twilight sky. Jupiter is below the red star Aldebaran and is spectacularly close to Mars on the 15th.

Saturn climbs higher in the late evening sky and the Moon is close to Saturn on the 21st.

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/