Archive
10/07/2013 – Ephemeris – The moon will appear to pass Venus early tomorrow morning
Ephemeris for Monday, October 7th. The sun will rise at 7:48. It’ll be up for 11 hours and 23 minutes, setting at 7:11. The moon, 3 days past new, will set at 8:47 this evening.
The moon will be passing the planet Venus around 7 a.m. tomorrow morning, when they will be below the horizon. So tonight and tomorrow evenings we will have before and after views of the event. Tonight the thin crescent moon will be nearly the width of your fist held at arm’s length to the right of Venus. In binoculars or a telescope only the Sea of Crises is completely uncovered by the moon’s terminator. If you haven’t checked out Venus lately, do so. It is now a bit more than half illuminated by the sun. It’s coming almost directly at the earth now at about 80 million miles away and that distance is decreasing by 650 thousand miles a day. Don’t worry, it will miss us by 25 million miles in January, passing between the Earth and the Sun.
Times are for the Traverse City/Interlochen area of Michigan. They may be different for your location.
Addendum
Venus and the Moon on Monday October 7, 2013 at 8 p.m. Created using Stellarium.
Venus and the Moon on Tuesday October 8, 2013 at 8 p.m. Created using Stellarium.
10/04/2013 – Ephemeris – Grand Traverse Astronomical Society events this weekend
Ephemeris for Friday, October 4th. The sun will rise at 7:44. It’ll be up for 11 hours and 32 minutes, setting at 7:17. The moon is new today, and won’t be visible.
The Grand Traverse Astronomical Society will be running some counter programming to the Midwest Space Fest going on in downtown Traverse City tonight. It wasn’t intentional, but tonight’s out normal meeting night and star party at Northwestern Michigan College’s Rogers Observatory. The program for the society starts at 8 p.m. with a talk by member Daron Smith. His topic will be element formation starting from the time of the Big Bang. Every element in our body except hydrogen was cooked up in stars. At 9 p.m. there will be a star party till about 11 p.m. If cloudy, there will be an alternate program. Tomorrow the society with other astronomy clubs will have their telescopes at the Open Space in Traverse City to view the sun during the day and the rest of the universe at night. Rain will cancel that event. Clouds will cancel the night portion only. There will be other fun and educational things to do during the day.
Times are for the Traverse City/Interlochen area of Michigan. They may be different for your location.
Addendum
Day time viewing at the Open Space. Transit of Venus, June 5, 2012.
10/03/2013 – Ephemeris – Last call for the Midwest Space Fest
Thursday, October 3rd. The sun will rise at 7:43. It’ll be up for 11 hours and 35 minutes, setting at 7:18. The moon, 1 day before new, will rise at 7:19 tomorrow morning.
The Midwest Space Fest starts tomorrow evening. This is a bit late, but there could be seats available for some events. Check out magnorth.org for more information. Paid events are at the State Theater and ECCO Event Space, 121 Front St. Friday Night and Dr Filippenko Saturday morning. Free events are also Saturday including NASA and other astronomical exhibits at the ECCO Event Space plus sun viewing during the day and later on a star party at the Open Space on the bay. Full disclosure, the Space Fest is the brainchild of Carolyn McKellar a family friend. I knew her when she was yea high. She’s an amateur astronomer, who at one time wanted to be an astrophysicist. However her interest turned to coordinating events like this.
Times are for the Traverse City/Interlochen area of Michigan. They may be different for your location.
Addendum
Michigan Science Center is bringing their inflatable STARLAB planetarium which will be set up in room 101 in NMC’s Health and Science Building Saturday from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Free tickets can be reserved here.
10/02/2013 – Ephemeris – Where are the bright planets and one dim comet?
Ephemeris for Wednesday, October 2nd. The sun will rise at 7:41. It’ll be up for 11 hours and 38 minutes, setting at 7:20. The moon, 2 days before new, will rise at 6:14 tomorrow morning.
Time again to check out the bright planets. Saturn and Venus will be at the same height above the west southwestern horizon. Dimmer Saturn will be to the right of Venus by one and a half widths of a fist held at arm’s length. Binoculars may be needed to Saturn. Saturn will set at 8:40, while Venus will set at 8:56 p.m.. We are losing Saturn in the sun’s glare for a few months. The rest of the planetary action will be in the morning sky. The giant planet Jupiter will rise at 12:36 a.m. in the east northeast. It’s cruising against the stars of Gemini this viewing season. By 6 a.m it will be high in the southeast, the brightest object in that direction. Mars will rise at 3:30 a.m. also in the east northeast. It’s in the east at 6 a.m.
Times are for the Traverse City/Interlochen area of Michigan. They may be different for your location.
Addendum
Venus and Saturn low on the west southwestern horizon along with Saturn at 8:15 p.m. on October 2, 2013. Created using Stellarium.
I was out at the Lanphier Observatory of the Leelanau School in Glen Arbor Michigan Monday evening about this time, to show Venus to the audience for Andrea Wulf’s talk about some of her book Chasing Venus. If the book is like her talk, it should be fabulous. It’s about the 18th century expeditions of many nation to view a pair of transits of Venus in order to determine the size of the solar system. Anyway the sky was like this with Venus setting over the low Sleeping Bear Dunes across Sleeping Bear Bay.
Jupiter, Mars with the winter stars and constellations at 6 a.m. on October 3, 2012. Created using Stellarium.
The tracks of Mars and Comet ISON at 6 a.m. from October 3 to 9, 2013. The comet may still be too faint to view in binoculars. Chart created using Cartes duCiel.
The yellow line is the ecliptic. The blue line is the constellations lines for Leo. Comet ISON positions are blue dots. It’s too far away for the software to show a tail.
Bob Moler's Ephemeris Blog 