Snoeshow Under The Stars
Aurora Watch
A
series of Coronal Mass Ejections have erupted from our Star. The first of
these struck our planet on Wednesday evening. This triggered widespread
auroral activity on Thursday . I got a quick peak at some very faint northern
lights... just before sunrise... and just before things really kicked into
high gear. For hours after sunrise here in Park City, the northern lights
danced :-(
A second CME is expected to arrive this evening. Skywatchers are advised to keep an eye on the northern horizon.
Douglas D. Dankel of Akureyri, Iceland captured this sweet shot on 1/22/04 using a Nikon D100 camera and 6-8 second exposures.
Opportunity Knocks
The
Mars Opportunity Rover is scheduled to land on the red planet this Saturday
night, 1/24/04. The accompanying image simulates the view from the approaching
spacecraft.
If all goes well, Opportunity will land on the opposite side of the planet from where it's twin Spirit touched down.
Read the full story on the Mars Exploration Rover Mission Website.
Mars Spirit Mission Status
The
Mars Spirit Rover reached out and grabbed this football sized rock. It used
on-board microscopes and spectrometers to examine the makeup of the angular
rock astronomers have dubbed "Adirondack". Spirit also drilled into
the rock to study the internal makeup of the rock.
Read the full story on the Mars Exploration Rover Mission Website.
The
accompanying images was captured by Spirit as it turned to look at it's landing
site... now known as the Columbia Memorial Station. In the distance to the upper
right is a ridge that is a future Spirit destination. The ridge is about 3
kilometers from the landing site.
The
Spirit Rover fell silent on Wednesday. Orbiting spacecraft could detect it's
presence, but... no signals were being sent. Spirit
then radioed a beep Thursday morning
confirming that it had received a transmission from Earth. Still, it
has not returned any data since early Wednesday. Flight-team
engineers for NASA's Mars
Exploration Rover Project are working to diagnose the cause of
communications difficulties. See the JPL press
release and Reuters
for more details.
Reports this morning are that Spirit has sent a radio transmissions acknowledging that it had received commands from Earth. Keep an eye on the mission's status by visiting JPL's Mars Rover Website.
The Grand Canyon of Mars
The orbiting Mars Express Spacecraft recently tested out it's optical system when it captured this portion of the 1700 mile long Valles Marineris, The Grand Canyon of Mars. Apparently all systems are go. Find out more about this and other incredible images by visiting the Mars Express Website.
Comet C/2002 T7 Linear
How's this for a beautiful shot? Yea, I know... we've had beautiful images of this comet before. What makes this image so amazing? Well... it was taken by High School Students in Denmark, that's what! On December 28th, 2003, they managed to snag this beautiful shot.
The comet is now about mag7.8. This should put it within easy reach of most binoculars and small telescopes. and is expected to reach perihelion on April 23rd, 2004 and brighten to between mag0 & mag1... making this an easy naked eye comet for springtime observers. Views through a telescope or binoculars ought to be absolutely incredible by then!
The comet is currently cruising through the constellation Pisces, which is high in the sky shortly after dark. Now would be a great time to get out and observe the brightening comet. Click here for ephemeris to help you find the comet... or here for analysis of the comets journey.
Mercury & The Moon
Monday morning brought the Moon near the innermost planet, Mercury. The two shared the eastern horizon in the pre-dawn hours. Ginger Mayfield took this shot as the two climbed above Pike's Peak, Colorado.
Solar System
The
midsection of our star is covered in sunspots. Each capable of delivering a
solar flare. On Tuesday, Sunspot #540 (lower right) launched a C-Class
Coronal Mass Ejection our way.
The sun is a fascinating subject. It's appearance changes from day to day. In fact, it is the only star in the sky that we can see any details on at all! If you'd like to observe our star, make sure you do so safely. Checkout these Safe Viewing Techniques.
Checkout
the huge solar
filament in this sweet Jack Newton
image of our star.
If you'd like to see more of Jack's incredible images, checkout his website... www.JackNewton.com
Check
out this incredible shot by Gary Palmer.
The huge magnetic filament seen arcing off the sun could easily encompass 50
planet Earths.
Planetary Report
Mercury, the 1st Planet
| Rising: | 6:25 am | |
| Visual Magnitude: | -0.13 | |
| Visual Diameter: | 6" | |
| Distance: | 1.12 AU | |
| Constellation: | Sagittarius |
Now is a great time to look for Mercury as the first rock can be found rising in the southeast about an hour and a half before the sun. It's also fairly bright at mag -0.13... though this should be tempered by it's location in the rapidly brightening pre-dawn sky. Mercury will be visible in the east for another several days... before it rapidly dives towards the sun. It will then reappear in the western horizon after sunset in the coming weeks.
This beautiful image captures the devastation the planets surface has received through the years. Centered on the Degas Ray Crater, it gives hints of the havoc associated with life in the early solar system..
Venus, the 2nd Planet
| Rising: | 9:40 am | |
| Visual Magnitude: | -4.05 | |
| Visual Diameter: | 14" | |
| Distance: | 1.17 AU | |
| Constellation: | Aquarius |
Venus
is now rising little more than two hours after the sun. You should now be able
to find it easily in the evening sky shortly after sundown. In fact, now would be a
good time to start watching Venus. Why? Well, because Venus is getting ready
for some major changes. It is currently 79% illuminated. As it climbs higher
in the sky over the coming months, it will grow considerably in size and
brightness... while shrinking just as considerably in phase. By late
winter / early spring Venus will only be 1/2 illuminated, but will be almost
half again as bright.
I've been catching Venus above the western horizon about 30-45 minutes after sunset for the last couple of months. It is now high enough that you can actually view it at a leisurely pace. It'll only get easier at this point. Slowly but surely, Venus will come to dominate the night sky. If you have a nice wide sky horizon to horizon, compare Venus with Saturn. They're both about the same height above the horizon shortly after dark... Venus in the west... and Saturn in the east.
This beautiful Hubble Space Telescope image shows us some fine detail in Venus' dense cloudtop.
Need to no more about Venus? Checkout this article by The Planetary Society.
Earth, the 3rd Planet
The Grand Canyon
While not as big as Mars' Grand Canyon, Earth's Grand Canyon is far more accessible. It is also quite a spectacular site in it's own right. The Grand Canyon is a prime example of just how dynamic our planet is.
Lunar Phase
The
moon reached new on Wednesday. In the meantime, we'll be
under waning crescent phase with 5% of the moon's visible surface
illuminated when it rises around 9:20am. At this point, the moon is sitting
low in the western sky as the sun is setting.
The accompanying image was taken by Anthony Arrigo
of Utah Skies with a Sony DSC-F717 digital camera an 1800mm f/12
Maksutov-Cassegrain telescope.
Visit our Lunar
Information Page for even more great images and information
Mars, the 4th Planet
| Rising: | 11:10 am | |
| Visual Magnitude: | 0.61 | |
| Visual Diameter: | 7" | |
| Distance: | 1.32 AU | |
| Constellation: | Pisces |
Mars is in the news lately... a fleet of spacecraft are arriving to study the red planet. This beautiful image was taken by former Utah Skies Astrophotographer of the Month... the deep sky wiz... Robert Gendler.
Jupiter, the 5th Planet
| Rising: | 9:15 pm | |
| Visual Magnitude: | -2.35 | |
| Visual Diameter: | 42" | |
| Distance: | 4.67 AU | |
| Constellation: | Leo |
Jupiter
can now be seen rising late at night... or high in the morning sky... just before first light is approaches.
Jupiter and it's moons are involved in a continuous dance. Views will
only be improving for the next several months, so... get out and take a peak
at the giant planet.
The accompanying image was taken by former Utah Skies Astrophotographer of the Month, Ed Grafton. Ed took this shot from his home in suburban Houston. Sweet, huh? Ed is continually adding to his website, so.. .go check it out!
Look for the Moon and Jupiter to pose together Sunday night and into Monday morning. The two will be just over 2° apart.
Saturn, the 6th Planet
| Rising: | 3:30 pm | |
| Visual Magnitude: | -0.33 | |
| Visual Diameter: | 20" | |
| Distance: | 8.13 AU | |
| Constellation: | Gemini |
Saturn
reached opposition on New Years Eve. Opposition occurs when the Sun and Saturn appear in opposite directions
as viewed from Earth. So, on December 31st, as the Sun is setting, Saturn
will be rising. This opposition should provide us with some of the best
views of Saturn in quite some time. Saturn always looks great, right? What
makes this year so special? Well... first off, Saturn recently reached
perihelion... it's nearest distance to the Sun. This makes it seem just a
little brighter than usual. Second, Saturn's rings are tipped about as much
as they can be... roughly
26° from edge-on. This gives us a great view of
the solar systems most incredible ring system. Third, Saturn is cruising
much further north than usual. This puts Saturn in a favorable position for
northerners. Saturn spend much of the night in the clearest, steadiest
portion of the sky.
This gorgeous shot of the ringed planet was taken by former Utah Skies Astrophotographer of the Month, Ed Grafton. Have you checked out his website lately, if not... what are you waiting for ;-)
Ok... here's an interesting note... Saturn's shadow... visible recent images on the rings... are now hidden... they were on the left side of the planet... and will soon switch and reappear on the opposite side in the coming months. Make a mental note next time you're out viewing.
Uranus, the 7th Planet
| Rising: | 9:15 am | |
| Visual Magnitude: | 5.92 | |
| Visual Diameter: | 3" | |
| Distance: | 20.90 AU | |
| Constellation: | Aquarius |
Interested
in viewing the 7th planet? You'd better get on it quick. Uranus
is rising in the early afternoon... putting it high in the sky by the time
it gets dark If you wait too far after dark, you'll have trouble viewing the
planet in the turbulent skies above the western horizon. Uranus has recently dropped back to
3" in apparent
diameter. 1" smaller than it's peak this fall. Ok.. it's only a 1"
decline, right... Well... there wasn't a whole lot to work with originally.
1" marks a 25% decline... So... don't waste any time..This beautiful HST image shows a newly discovered moon as well as Uranus' delicate ring system.
Interested in seeing Uranus... but don't know where to look? The bright planet Venus will be less than 1° from Uranus on Wednesday evening (1/14/04)
Neptune, the 8th Planet
| Rising: | 8:25 am | |
| Visual Magnitude: | 7.98 | |
| Visual Diameter: | 2" | |
| Distance: | 31.04 AU | |
| Constellation: | Capricornus |
Astronomers
pointed the sharp eyed Hubble Telescope at Neptune and discovered that
Neptune's Great Dark Spot (discovered by Voyager 2) had disappeared... and
then reappeared... this time in the northern hemisphere! Current thinking is
that the spot might be a hole in Neptune's methane cloud tops... potentially
allowing us to get a view lower in Neptune's atmosphere.
Pluto, the 9th Planet
| Rising: | 4:35 am | |
| Visual Magnitude: | 13.97 | |
| Visual Diameter: | <1" | |
| Distance: | 31.47 AU | |
| Constellation: | Serpens |
Astronomers made a surprising discovery about Pluto recently. As Pluto begins to move away from the Sun... towards the beginning of it's winter... things are actually heating up on the distant planet instead of cooling down. Checkout CNN.com/SPACE for more detailsTake this bit of planetary information either as an interesting side note, or an observing challenge. Pluto is in the constellation Ophiuchus, less than °1 southwest of NGC6309 aka The Bug Nebula. I viewed The Bug this past weekend, so... photons from Pluto must have hit my retina :-) At magnitude 13.9, Pluto is basically out of reach of smaller telescopes... Even in the big scope... it's difficult to be sure that you've seen Pluto. One way to verify that you have found Pluto is to sketch the star patterns over several nights. If you have actually found Pluto, one of the the faint star-like objects will have moved over the course of a few nights. This is Pluto.
This image was taken by The
Hubble Space Telescope.
Need more information? Checkout the Pluto
Home Page.
Deep Sky
Hubble Vision
Hubble Captures Merger Between Quasar and GalaxyThis NASA Hubble Space Telescope image shows evidence fo r a merger between a quasar and a companion galaxy. This surprising result might require theorists to rethink their explanations for the nature of quasars, the most energetic objects in the universe.
The bright central object is the quasar itself, located several billion light-years away. The two wisps of material on the (left) of the bright central object are remnants of a bright galaxy that have been disrupted by the mutual gravitational attraction between the quasar and the companion galaxy. This provides clear evidence for a merger between the two objects.
Since their discovery in 1963, quasars (quasi-stellar objects) have been enigmatic because they emit prodigious amounts of energy from a very compact source. The most widely accepted model is that a quasar is powered by a supermassive black hole in the core of a galaxy.
These new observations proved a challenge for theorists as no current models predict the complex quasar interactions unveiled by Hubble.
The image was taken with the Wide Field Planetary Camera-2.
Credit: John Bahcall, Institute for Advanced Study, NASA.
If you are able to find all of these objects, you may be one of the
few, the proud, the Deep Sky Obsessed.
E-mail your findings to DeepSkyObservations@UtahSkies.org.
IDA-Utah Light Pollution Update
Stay up to date on astronomical happenings by regularly checking the Utah Skies website at http://www.UtahSkies.org