Bob Moler's Ephemeris Blog

This is Ephemeris for Thursday, December 11th. Today the Sun will be up for 8 hours and 51 minutes, setting at 5:02, and it will rise tomorrow at 8:11. The Moon, at last quarter today, will rise at 12:53 tomorrow morning.

The first constellation of winter is in the northeastern sky, called Auriga the charioteer. It’s to the upper left of Orion and directly left of Taurus. Auriga actually never really quite leaves us, because its brightest star, Capella is the star that never leaves us even in the heat of summer, Though for most of us it’s in the trees in the north. Auriga is a pentagon of stars with the Capella on top. Just right of Capella is a thin triangle of three faint stars, an asterism or informal constellation called the Kids, baby goats. Capella is their mother. For some reason they are all held by a charioteer, who is shown without his chariot. Ptolemy, last of the great Greek astronomers called Auriga the coachman. If so, he did have room for the goats.

The astronomical event times given in this blog are for the Traverse City/Interlochen area of Michigan (Lat 44.7° N, Long 85.7° W; EDT, UT – 4 hours) unless stated otherwise. Times will be different for other locations.

Addendum