Astroblog: Seeing Vesta at Opposition (2 May 2025)

Friday, April 25, 2025

Seeing Vesta at Opposition (2 May 2025)


Evening sky on Friday, May 2 as seen from Adelaide at 23:00 ACST. Asteroid Vesta is at apposition in Libra. The inset is the binocular view of Vesta at this time. At magnitude 5.7 it will be an easy binocular object near clear guide stars. Similar views will be seen elsewhere in Australia at the equivalent local time.	The approximate wide field binocular view of Vesta and the guide stars at 23:00 ACST from Friday, April 25 on with the track of Vesta shown (click to embiggen, similar views will be seen elsewhere at the equivalent local time).

Black and white horizon chart facing North suitable for printing showing the guide objects of 4 Vesta, Antares, 𝛃 Librae (Zubeneschamali), μ Virginis (Rijl Al Awwa, unlabeled in this view) and Arcturus as seen from Adelaide at 23:00 ACST at Saturday 25 April. Similar views will be seen elsewhere in Australia at the equivalent local time. Use the charts above to orient yourself to get to the guide stars.	Black and white binocular chart suitable for printing showing the movement of 4 Vesta over April-May. The large circle represents the field of view of 10x50 binoculars. Click to embiggen and print. Use the horizon chart to the left for orientation first.

The Asteroid 4 Vesta is one of the iconic minor planets, and one of two orbited by the Dawn spacecraft. At favorable oppositions Vesta is bright enough to be seen with the unaided eye under dark sky conditions. This year it gets to magnitude 5.7 just over unaided eye visibility at dark sky sites. Not really visible from suburban skies, but it will be easily visible in binoculars and small telescopes.

This year Friday, May 2 is a good opposition of Vesta, when it will reach a magnitude of 5.7 at its brightest with reasonable guide stars and no Moon interference.

Vesta has some reasonable signposts to it, just before and just after opposition Vesta is roughly between the bright stars Aldebaran and Arcturus, not far from the dimmer but still reasonably obvious 𝛃 Librae (Zubeneschamali). Vesta is within 1-2 binocular widths of 𝛃 Librae (Zubeneschamali) and the less obvious μ Virginis (Rijl Al Awwa). From tonight it is almost on top of the dim star 16 Librae, then moves progressively towards μ Virginis (Rijl Al Awwa), see the charts above. There are also a number of obvious asterisms (see printable binocular chart), allowing 16 Librae and μ Virginis to be easily located. Vesta's movement from night to night is easily seen.

Finding Vesta with the back and white charts should be easy. Print them out and use with a red-light torch (or a standard torch with red cellophane over it) so as to not disturb your night vision.

The waxing Moon will interfere later in the month, but now there is no Moon interference up to opposition allowing Vesta and its guide stars to be easily seen.

Labels: 4 Vesta, Asteroid, binocular