Bob Moler's Ephemeris Blog

Ephemeris for Thursday, September 13th.  The sun will rise at 7:19.  It’ll be up for 12 hours and 36 minutes, setting at 7:55.   The moon, 2 days before new, will rise at 5:43 tomorrow morning.

High overhead the Milky Way is seen passing through the Summer Triangle of three bright stars.  Here we find the Milky Way split into two sections.  The split starts in the constellation of Cygnus the Swan or Northern Cross nearly overhead and heads southward.  The western part of the Milky Way ends southwest of the Aquila the eagle.  This dark dividing feature is called the Great Rift.  The rift is a great series of clouds obscures the light of the stars behind it.  It appears to be about 300 light years away and obscures the light of the stars of the next spiral arm in.  It may contain the mass of a million suns.  Dust clouds like this are a prominent features of spiral galaxies, like the Milky Way.

Times are for the Traverse City/Interlochen area of Michigan.  They may be different for your location.

Addendum

The Great Rift in the Milky Way. Created using Stellarium.

P.S.

Semper Fi

My grandson Chris the Marine celebrates his 22nd birthday today. He’s in the desert today in the US. Beats Afghanistan where he was last year at this time.