Report for 2001-06-01
Welcome to the Utah Skies Report.
Brought to you from beautiful Park City, "View-tah".
Lunar
Phase
| The moon is approaching full. As such it
will be rising just before sundown and staying with us most of the night.
The moon will dominate the nighttime sky. Only the planets can withstand
its overwhelming brightness.
Try to make it a point to get out and observe the moon as people have done for centuries. It presents a significant amount of detail even to the naked eye. If you have binoculars or a telescope, you can spend a considerable amount of time exploring its craters and other prominent features. |
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| Sunrise: 5:58 am | Sunset: 8:52 pm |
| Astronomical Twilight Ends: 3:56 am | Astronomical Twilight Begins: 10:53 pm |
| Moonrise: 4:21 am | Moonset: 3:42 pm |
The Space Station is Coming to Park City
| The International Space Station will make
several passes over Park City this weekend. The table to the right lists
the times when it will be visible from this area. With a visual magnitude
of -1, the ISS is as bright as the brightest stars in the sky. You'll know
you're looking at the space station because it will be moving steadily
across the sky. So, if somebody claims to have seen a UFO, you can tell them that you saw it too! |
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Astronomy 101
This section of our report has been added to help
those who are new to astronomy to come up to speed quickly. Many of the terms
used throughout this report can seem confusing or complicated the first time you
encounter them. We'll be trying to demystify astronomy in this section. If you
have questions about terms or concepts you encounter, send us and e-mail and
we'll try to cover them in this section.
In today's lesson, we'll cover some real basics. Stars. What is a star? A star
is a huge ball of gas which radiates energy generated by nuclear fusion. Sound
complicated? Ok then, how's this? Our sun is a star. It's a very close star, but
it is a star just like every star in the sky. Wait a minute you're thinking.
That bright orange ball of energy which can cause sun burns... a star??? Yup!
But how come its so much brighter than all the other stars? Is it the brightest
star in the whole universe? Nope. Studies indicate that the sun is a very
average star. Larger than some and smaller than others. The reason that our sun
is so much brighter than all the other stars in the sky is because it is so much
closer than all the other stars. This point leads us to our next point of
discussion, astronomical distances. The universe covers distances which are so absurdly
large that they defy our ability even to conceptualize them. With that said, I'm
going to try to paint a picture for you anyway.
Physicists will tell you that light travels at 186,000 mph. Wow! This is a huge
distance, but one which we can conceptualize. Here's an example. If you drive
20,000 miles per year (not an unreasonable amount), you'd need to drive roughly
9 years to cover this distance. Have you ever driven cross country? Well, that
would be 3000 round trips from New York to San Francisco every second. Does that
help to put things in perspective?
You have probably heard astronomical distances described in light years. A light
year is simply the distance that light travels in one year. Nothing complex
there, right? Well, not on the surface. If you do the math, one light year
equates to 6.25 trillion miles (6,250,000,000,000). Wow! The nearest star
beyond our sun is Alpha Centauri. It's distance is about 4.25 light years. A
simple calculation places it at about 25 trillion miles (25,000,000,000,000).
That's 12 zeros in case you're wondering. Conceptualizing this distance is a bit
more complex. Here's something which you might find helpful. Around 1970, we
launched the Viking space craft. It's been traveling through the solar system
for 3 decades. Recent signals received from it place its distance at about 8
billion miles from earth. That's billion with a B. In 30 years, one of our
rockets traveled 8 billion miles, yet the nearest star is 25 trillion miles
away. So, we've gone about 1/3000th of the way to the nearest star. In other
words, it would take about 90,000 years for a rocket to travel to the nearest
star. Are you getting a feel for the kind of large we're talking about here?
Ok... Enough science class... Let's get out and do some observing!
Planetary Report
| Mars is rising in the southeast shortly after 10m. Mars
has grown to over 19" on it's way to just shy of 21" in Mid
June. This is the largest Mars has appeared in over a decade! Mars has also brightened to a blazing magnitude -2.1 making it the
brightest star-like object in the night sky. As I've mentioned previously, this combination of increased brightness and increased size is providing us with some of the best views of Mars in over a decade. I got some spectacular views of Mars earlier this week. The details on the planets surface are impressive. If you own a telescope, or know someone who does, take it out and use it. Objects like Mars are really easy to look at with a telescope. Just center the object in your finder scope and look in the eyepiece. It's that simple. The planets and the moon are great places to start your journey through the universe. Why not start tonight? Mars is currently moving from Sagittarius into Scorpius where it will spend most of the summer. Mars reaches its Zenith, or highest point in the sky, around 2:15am. Best views of the planet start around 11:30pm. |
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Venus is rising in the east about 4:00am. If you're
an early riser, you may have noticed the intensely bright star to the
east. Well, that's no star. It's the second planet, Venus. Blazing at a
-4.4 magnitude, Venus is by far the brightest star-like object in the sky.
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Constellation Report
Our Constellation report is an easy way for people to become familiar
with the nighttime sky. We’ll discuss myths associated with the various
constellations as well as describing the numerous deep sky objects residing
in the area. No equipment is required to view the constellations, though
a star chart can be quite helpful. This ease of observing makes constellations
a natural place to begin your journey to the stars. This weekend we’ll focus on the constellation
Coma Berenices.
| Coma Berenices is a relatively faint constellation. It is however quite interesting. For instance, it is home to a part of the Virgo-Cluster of galaxies. Coma Berenices is located between the Hunting Dogs, Canes Venatici to the north, Virgo to the south, Leo on the west border and Bootes on the east border. |  |
Deep Sky Report
The focus of our efforts this week will be the deep sky objects of Coma Berenices.
| First off, lets visit with the spiral galaxy M64
(mag8.5). Also known as the Black Eye Galaxy because of a conspicuous dark
structure which obscures star light in the center of the galaxy, the dust feature is
easily visible even in smaller telescopes. This galaxy should be
relatively easy to find using the provided star chart.
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Moving on, we come to the lenticular
galaxy M85 (mag 9.2). M85 is the northernmost member of the Virgo Cluster in Messier's catalog, and
just falls within the constellation Coma Berenices.
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| Next up is the spiral galaxy M88 (mag9.6) Looking quite similar to the Andromeda galaxy which we'll visit later this summer, M88 is one of the easier galaxies to locate in this area. It's brightness combined with its compact size gives it pretty good surface brightness. You may also notice the pair of 12th magnitude stars along its southeastern edge. |
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Next we come to the barred spiral galaxy M91 (mag 10.2). This galaxy contains an interesting bit of history. Plainly stated, we can not find M91. There are no deep sky objects residing at the location recorded by Messier. The most logical explanation is that Messier calculated or recorded the location incorrectly. Astronomers currently believe that Messier was actually referring to NGC4548, a 10th magnitude barred spiral galaxy located some 4 degrees to the northwest. | ||
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Continuing along we come to the edge-on spiral galaxy M98 (mag 10.1). Located at the southern edge of the constellation, this galaxy sits just 1/2 degree west of 6 Comae Berenices. Use this star to help identify this galaxy. If you miss the star, you'll probably stumble into one of the numerous galaxies in the area, so.. pay attention ;) |
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Next up is the beautiful spiral galaxy M99 (mag9.8). Located less that 1 degree to the southwest of the star 6 Comae Berenices (listed above), this face-on pinwheel of a galaxy is a beautiful sight. | ||
| Finally, we come to yet another spiral galaxy M100 (mag 9.4). This beautiful spiral puts on a better show for cameras than for telescopic viewing. Nevertheless, it can be found just about 3 degrees northeast of 6 Comae Berenices. |  |
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Moving on we come to our Utah Skies Challenge of
the week. Located just 3 degrees southeast of Gamma Comae Berenices is
the edge-on spiral galaxy NGC4565(mag9.6). This gem shows up as a
ghostly spindle in a 6". To view the dust lane requires at least
an 8-12" though. NGC4565 is located to the east of Coma Berenices "hair", another interesting object in its own right, the loose star cluster Melotte 111. If you are able to find these object, you may be one of the few, the proud, the Deep Sky Obsessed. E-mail your findings to DeepSkyObservations@UtahSkies.org.
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Utah Skies is currently working with members of
the Utah Legislature to seek a viable, long term solution to light
pollution in our area. If you support this goal, please show your
support by e-mailing your representatives. Tell them that you would
like to see Utah moving aggressively to implement intelligent lighting
solutions. To make it easy for you, we have added links to both the
House and Senate rosters. Go ahead! Send your Utah Senators and Representatives an email and tell them how you feel! |
Next Weeks Report
Next week, we'll continue our journey through the cosmos
and focus on the constellation Bootes.
Closing
This "Star Cast" has been presented by Utah Skies. View-tah’s Astronomy Home. Utah Skies can be found on the World Wide Web
at http://www.UtahSkies.org. Visit
our site and discover the cosmos. While you're there, sign up to receive the free,
fully illustrated Utah Skies Report. Many of our up coming star parties will only
be announced to people on our e-mailing list. Sign up today.
