Bob Moler's Ephemeris Blog

Ephemeris for Wednesday, January 25th.  The sun will rise at 8:08.  It’ll be up for 9 hours and 31 minutes, setting at 5:40.   The moon, 2 days past new, will set at 8:42 this evening.

It’s time again to take a look at the whereabouts of the bright planets.  Venus is brilliant in the southwestern sky after sunset and will set at 9:01 in the west.  Jupiter is the most prominent planet of the evening sky, once Venus sets.  It’s located high in the south southeast as it gets dark and is seen against the stars of the constellation Aries.  It will pass due south at 6:21 p.m. and it will set at 1:08 a.m.. Mars will rise at 9:36 p.m in the east northeast and is below the hind end of the  constellation Leo the lion.  It is 76.7 million miles away and closing and has been getting brighter.  It’s now as bright as most first magnitude stars.  Mars will pass due south at 4:02 a.m.  Saturn will rise at 12:49 a.m. just to the left of the bright star Spica in the east southeast.

* Times, as always are for the Traverse City/Interlochen area of  Michigan.

Addendum

Mars 9 days ago. Photograph by Scott Anttila

Another gorgeous shot of Mars by Scott Anttila.  At the time Mars appeared 10.3 seconds of arc in diameter.  By comparison the moon and sun appear about 1,800 seconds of arc in diameter.  Note that Mars appears slightly gibbous in shape.  It will appear full on March 3rd. when it will be in opposition from the sun.  It will be closest to us on March 5th. at about 62.6 million miles.  At that time it will have an apparent diameter of 13.9 seconds of arc.