Home > Uncategorized > 12/01/2020 – Ephemeris – Previewing December skies

12/01/2020 – Ephemeris – Previewing December skies

December 1, 2020

This is Ephemeris for Tuesday, December 1st. Today the Sun will be up for 9 hours and 2 minutes, setting at 5:03, and it will rise tomorrow at 8:01. The Moon, 1 day past full, will rise at 6:02 this evening.

Let’s look at December skies. We are now in the holiday season and about to celebrate the southernmost travel of the Sun in the sky and its return northward. So there is not much change in sunrise and sunset times. The Sun will stop its travel south, the winter solstice, on the 21st at 5:02 am. It will make that day the shortest day in terms of daylight hours. However, the earliest sunset will occur on the 9th. The Geminid meteor shower will reach its peak on the evening of the 13th, near new moon. Also in the evening on the 21st Jupiter and Saturn will be in conjunction and will be easily visible in the same binocular or low power telescope field. This month starts out with a surprisingly active Sun at the start of a new sunspot cycle.

The event times given are for the Traverse City/Interlochen area of Michigan. They may be different for your location.

Addendum

December Evening Star Chart

December 2020 evening star chart

Star Chart for December 2020 (7 p.m. EST December 15, 2019). Click on image to enlarge. Created using my LookingUp program. Click on image to enlarge.
Credit my LookingUp program.

The planets and stars are plotted for the 15th at 7 pm EST (two hours earlier this year to include Jupiter and Saturn) in the evening and 6 a.m. for the morning chart. These are the chart times. Note that Traverse City is located approximately 45 minutes behind our time meridian, West 75° longitude. (An hour 45 minutes behind our daylight saving time meridian during EDT).

December Morning Star Chart

December 2020 Morning Star Chart

Star Chart for December mornings 2020 (6 a.m. EST December 15, 2020). Click on image to enlarge. Created using my LookingUp program. Credit my LookingUp program.

For a list of constellation names to go with the abbreviations click here.

  • Pointer stars at the front of the bowl of the Big Dipper point to Polaris the North Star.
  • The leaky bowl of the Big Dipper drips on Leo.
  • Follow the arc of the handle of the Big Dipper to the star Arcturus, then
  • Follow the spike to Spica.
  • The Summer Triangle is in red.
  • GemR on the star charts is the radiant of the Geminid meteor shower which peaks on the evening of the 13th.

Twilight Limits, Nautical and Astronomical

      EST        
  Morning twilight Evening twilight Dark night Moon
Date Astro. Nautical Nautical Astro. Start End Illum.
2020-12-01 6h21m 6h56m 18h15m 18h51m – – 0.99
2020-12-02 6h22m 6h57m 18h15m 18h50m 18h50m 18h51m 0.97
2020-12-03 6h23m 6h58m 18h15m 18h50m 18h50m 19h48m 0.92
2020-12-04 6h23m 6h59m 18h15m 18h50m 18h50m 20h52m 0.85
2020-12-05 6h24m 7h00m 18h15m 18h50m 18h50m 22h00m 0.77
2020-12-06 6h25m 7h01m 18h15m 18h50m 18h50m 23h12m 0.67
2020-12-07 6h26m 7h01m 18h15m 18h50m 18h50m – 0.56
2020-12-08 6h27m 7h02m 18h15m 18h50m 18h50m 0h25m 0.45
2020-12-09 6h28m 7h03m 18h15m 18h50m 18h50m 1h39m 0.33
2020-12-10 6h29m 7h04m 18h15m 18h50m 18h50m 2h55m 0.22
2020-12-11 6h29m 7h05m 18h15m 18h50m 18h50m 4h13m 0.13
2020-12-12 6h30m 7h05m 18h15m 18h51m 18h51m 5h33m 0.06
2020-12-13 6h31m 7h06m 18h15m 18h51m 18h51m 6h31m 0.01
2020-12-14 6h31m 7h07m 18h16m 18h51m 18h51m 6h31m 0
2020-12-15 6h32m 7h08m 18h16m 18h51m 18h51m 6h32m 0.02
2020-12-16 6h33m 7h08m 18h16m 18h52m 19h09m 6h33m 0.06
2020-12-17 6h29m 7h05m 18h13m 18h48m 20h19m 6h29m 0.13
2020-12-18 6h30m 7h06m 18h13m 18h49m 21h29m 6h30m 0.21
2020-12-19 6h31m 7h06m 18h14m 18h49m 22h37m 6h31m 0.3
2020-12-20 6h31m 7h07m 18h14m 18h49m 23h42m 6h31m 0.4
2020-12-21 6h32m 7h07m 18h14m 18h50m – 6h32m 0.5
2020-12-22 6h32m 7h08m 18h15m 18h51m 0h46m 6h32m 0.6
2020-12-23 6h33m 7h08m 18h16m 18h51m 1h47m 6h33m 0.69
2020-12-24 6h33m 7h08m 18h16m 18h52m 2h49m 6h33m 0.78
2020-12-25 6h33m 7h09m 18h17m 18h52m 3h51m 6h33m 0.85
2020-12-26 6h34m 7h09m 18h17m 18h53m 4h54m 6h34m 0.91
2020-12-27 6h34m 7h09m 18h18m 18h54m 5h57m 6h34m 0.96
2020-12-28 6h34m 7h10m 18h19m 18h54m – – 0.99
2020-12-29 6h35m 7h10m 18h20m 18h55m – – 0.99
2020-12-30 6h35m 7h10m 18h20m 18h56m – – 1
2020-12-31 6h35m 7h10m 18h21m 18h56m – – 0.99

Twilight calendar was generated using Cartes du Ciel (Sky Charts).

See my blog post: Twilight Zone for the definitions of the different periods of twilight here: https://bobmoler.wordpress.com/2018/09/27/.

NASA Calendar of Planetary Events

     Date     Time    Event
Dec 1  Tu            Venus: 27.5° W
    1  Tu  02:46 am  Moon Ascending Node
    2  We  08:22 pm  Moon North Dec.: 24.9° N
    4  Fr  08:10 pm  Moon-Beehive: 2.5° S
    7  Mo  07:37 pm  Last Quarter
   12  Sa  03:40 pm  Moon-Venus: 0.8° S
   12  Sa  03:42 pm  Moon Perigee: 361800 km
   13  Su  07:50 pm  Geminid Meteor Shower: ZHR = 120
   14  Mo  06:03 am  Moon Descending Node
   14  Mo  11:15 am  Total Solar Eclipse
                          (Pacific, S America, Atlantic)
   14  Mo  11:17 am  New Moon
   15  Tu  05:23 pm  Moon South Dec.: 24.9° S
   16  We  11:28 pm  Moon-Jupiter: 3° N
   17  Th  12:25 am  Moon-Saturn: 3.1° N
   19  Sa  09:56 pm  Mercury Superior Solar Conjunction
   21  Mo  05:02 am  Winter Solstice
   21  Mo  06:41 pm  First Quarter
   22  Tu  04:00 am  Ursid Meteor Shower: ZHR = 10
   22  Tu  04:35 am  Jupiter-Saturn: 0.1° N
   23  We  09:48 am  Venus-Antares: 5.6° N
   24  Th  11:32 am  Moon Apogee: 405000 km
   28  Mo  10:03 am  Moon Ascending Node
   29  Tu  10:28 pm  Full Moon
   30  We  02:53 am  Moon North Dec.: 24.9° N

All event times are given for UTC-5 Eastern Standard Time.

Sky Events Calendar by Fred Espenak and Sumit Dutta (NASA’s GSFC),
http://eclipse.gsfc.nasa.gov/SKYCAL/SKYCAL.html.

If you go to the above site you can print out a list like the above for the entire year or calendar pages for your time zone.

Sun and Moon Rising and Setting Events

LU                  Ephemeris of Sky Events for Interlochen/TC
December, 2020    Local time zone: EST
+-----------------------------------------------------------------------+
| DATE |  SUN     SUN  DAYLIGHT|   TWILIGHT*    |MOON  RISE OR    ILLUM |
|      |  RISE    SET    HOURS |  END    START  |PHASE SET** TIME FRACTN|
+=======================================================================+
|Tue  1| 08:00a  05:03p  09:02 | 06:12p  06:51a |      Rise 06:02p   98%|
|Wed  2| 08:01a  05:03p  09:01 | 06:12p  06:52a |      Rise 06:51p   94%|
|Thu  3| 08:02a  05:02p  09:00 | 06:12p  06:53a |      Rise 07:48p   88%|
|Fri  4| 08:03a  05:02p  08:58 | 06:12p  06:53a |      Rise 08:52p   80%|
|Sat  5| 08:04a  05:02p  08:57 | 06:12p  06:54a |      Rise 10:00p   71%|
+------+-----------------------+----------------+-----------------------+
|Sun  6| 08:05a  05:02p  08:56 | 06:12p  06:55a |      Rise 11:12p   61%|
|Mon  7| 08:06a  05:02p  08:55 | 06:12p  06:56a |L Qtr Rise 12:25a   50%|
|Tue  8| 08:07a  05:02p  08:54 | 06:12p  06:57a |      Rise 01:39a   39%|
|Wed  9| 08:08a  05:02p  08:53 | 06:12p  06:58a |      Rise 02:55a   28%|
|Thu 10| 08:09a  05:02p  08:52 | 06:12p  06:59a |      Rise 04:13a   18%|
|Fri 11| 08:10a  05:02p  08:51 | 06:12p  07:00a |      Rise 05:33a   10%|
|Sat 12| 08:11a  05:02p  08:51 | 06:12p  07:00a |      Rise 06:53a    4%|
+------+-----------------------+----------------+-----------------------+
|Sun 13| 08:12a  05:02p  08:50 | 06:13p  07:01a |      Rise 08:11a    1%|
|Mon 14| 08:12a  05:02p  08:49 | 06:13p  07:02a |New   Set  05:06p    0%|
|Tue 15| 08:13a  05:02p  08:49 | 06:13p  07:02a |      Set  06:03p    2%|
|Wed 16| 08:14a  05:03p  08:48 | 06:13p  07:03a |      Set  07:09p    7%|
|Thu 17| 08:14a  05:03p  08:48 | 06:14p  07:04a |      Set  08:18p   14%|
|Fri 18| 08:15a  05:03p  08:48 | 06:14p  07:04a |      Set  09:29p   22%|
|Sat 19| 08:16a  05:04p  08:48 | 06:15p  07:05a |      Set  10:37p   31%|
+------+-----------------------+----------------+-----------------------+
|Sun 20| 08:16a  05:04p  08:48 | 06:15p  07:05a |      Set  11:42p   40%|
|Mon 21| 08:17a  05:05p  08:48 | 06:16p  07:06a |F Qtr Set  12:45a   50%|
|Tue 22| 08:17a  05:05p  08:48 | 06:16p  07:06a |      Set  01:47a   60%|
|Wed 23| 08:18a  05:06p  08:48 | 06:17p  07:07a |      Set  02:49a   69%|
|Thu 24| 08:18a  05:07p  08:48 | 06:17p  07:07a |      Set  03:50a   77%|
|Fri 25| 08:18a  05:07p  08:48 | 06:18p  07:08a |      Set  04:53a   84%|
|Sat 26| 08:19a  05:08p  08:49 | 06:19p  07:08a |      Set  05:57a   91%|
+------+-----------------------+----------------+-----------------------+
|Sun 27| 08:19a  05:09p  08:49 | 06:19p  07:08a |      Set  07:00a   96%|
|Mon 28| 08:19a  05:09p  08:50 | 06:20p  07:09a |      Set  08:01a   99%|
|Tue 29| 08:19a  05:10p  08:50 | 06:21p  07:09a |Full  Rise 04:45p  100%|
|Wed 30| 08:19a  05:11p  08:51 | 06:21p  07:09a |      Rise 05:40p   99%|
|Thu 31| 08:20a  05:12p  08:52 | 06:22p  07:09a |      Rise 06:43p   96%|
+-----------------------------------------------------------------------+
* Nautical Twilight
** Moonrise or moonset, whichever occurs between sunrise and sunset

Generated using my LookingUp for DOS program.

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