Bob Moler's Ephemeris Blog

This is Ephemeris for Earth Day, Friday, April 22nd. Today the Sun will be up for 13 hours and 50 minutes, setting at 8:36, and it will rise tomorrow at 6:45. The Moon, 1 day before last quarter, will rise at 3:43 tomorrow morning.

The Lyrid meteor shower will still be active tonight and tomorrow morning from 10 pm to almost 4 am. Speaking of things hitting the Earth, NASA’s DART Mission to collide and deflect a small asteroid is still on its way to smash into a tiny asteroid in September to see how it works. A more predictable disaster is climate change or global warming, which is continuing to appear more rapid than earlier thought. It demands that nations start immediately to reduce carbon emissions to slow and eventually stop the rise in global temperatures. As someone said: “There is no Planet B”. Mars isn’t it. It’s too cold, too small, too dry, and the air is too thin and contains no free oxygen. So support your local planet, it’s the only one we’ve got.

The astronomical event times given are for the Traverse City/Interlochen area of Michigan (EDT, UT – 4 hours). They may be different for your location.

Addendum

There is an interesting Planet and morning planet encounter Sunday through Wednesday mornings as the Moon passes four planets.

The Moon passing the morning planets from Sunday to Wednesday mornings 4/24 to 4/27/2022. Note also the approach of Jupiter and Venus. Their paths will cross on Saturday, 4/30/2022. Click on the image to enlarge it. Created using Stellarium and GIMP