Bob Moler's Ephemeris Blog

Ephemeris for Thursday, May 26th.  Today the Sun will be up for 15 hours and 12 minutes, setting at 9:16, and will rise tomorrow at 6:03.   The Moon, 3 days before last quarter, will rise at 1:02 tomorrow morning.

The star Polaris is perhaps the most important star in the northern hemisphere sky.  That’s because it is nearly over the Earth’s north pole.  It’s also called the North Star or the Pole Star.  Polaris can be found by using the two stars at the front of the bowl of the Big Dipper,  These two stars, we call Pointer Stars do point very accurately to Polaris.  It is not the brightest star as some think, but a brighter than average star in a most unique position in the sky.  During the lifetimes of those now living Polaris will be getting slowly closer to the pole.  It won’t reach it, but in 100 years will begin to recede from the pole.  The altitude of Polaris in degrees approximately equals ones latitude.

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

Addendum

Looking North at the Big Dipper pointing at Polaris. Created using my Looking Up program.

Closeup of Polaris and the Celestial North Pole. The declination lines are 1 degree apart. Created using Cartes du Ciel (Sky Charts).