Bob Moler's Ephemeris Blog

Ephemeris for Wednesday, January 27th.  The Sun will rise at 8:07.  It’ll be up for 9 hours and 36 minutes, setting at 5:43.   The Moon, half way from full to last quarter, will rise at 9:43 this evening.

Let’s check out the whereabouts of the bright naked eye planets.  All the classical planets visible from antiquity are officially now in the morning sky.  However Jupiter actually will rise  at 9:30 p.m., in the east.  The Moon will be right below it tonight.  Jupiter’s still a morning planet since it’s not up at sunset.  Mars will rise next at 1:54 a.m. in the east-southeast.  It’s below and left of the bright star Spica.  Saturn will rise at 4:30 a.m. in the east-southeast.  Venus will rise at 6:11 a.m. again in the east-southeast.  Mercury is not favorably placed for northern hemispheric observers now.  Comet Catalina is up all night and is a binocular object crossing the line from the pointer stars in the Big Dipper and the North Star Polaris tonight.

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

Addendum

Jupiter and the Moon at 10 p.m. January 27, 2016. Created using Stellarium.

Jupiter and moons as they would appear in a telescope at 10 p.m. January 27, 2016. Created using Stellarium.

The Moon rising. Note the distortion of the atmospheric refraction squishes the Moon vertically being only a quarter-hour after it rose. 10 p.m., January 27, 2016. Created using Stellarium.

The morning planets and the Moon at 6:45 a.m., January 28, 2016. Created using Stellarium.

Saturn and its moons in a telescope on the morning of January 28, 2016. Created using Stellarium.

Comet Catalina’s path for the next week. Note the magnitudes for the comet are about correct. It will take binoculars or a small telescope to spot the comet which will not show a tail visually. Created using Stellarium.

This is a chart showing the sunrise and sunset skies for January 27, 2016 showing the location of the planets, the Moon and Comet Catalina at that time. Created using my LookingUp program.

Some of these images above are shown smaller than actual size.  Image expansion lately hasn’t worked.  If you are using Firefox, right-click on the image, and then click on View Image.