Bob Moler's Ephemeris Blog

This is Ephemeris for Thursday, October 1st. Today the Sun will be up for 11 hours and 42 minutes, setting at 7:23, and it will rise tomorrow at 7:42. The Moon, 2 days before last quarter, will rise at 10:06 this evening.

Let’s look at the skies for the month of October. The Sun will still be moving south rapidly. Daylight hours in the Interlochen/Traverse City area and will drop from 11 hours and 42 minutes today to 10 hours, 13 minutes at months end. The altitude of the sun above the southern horizon at local noon will be 42 degrees today in the Interlochen area and will descend to 31 degrees on Halloween. Venus will pass the Sun, moving from the evening sky to the morning sky on the 23rd. Venus has not been too noticeable in the evening for the last month, but by early November it will seem to suddenly appear in the morning sky. It can be mistaken as a UFO, especially with its tiny Cheshire Cat crescent smile in binoculars or a small telescope.

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

October Evening Star Chart

The planets and stars are plotted for the 15th at 10 p.m. EDT 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). To duplicate the star positions on a planisphere you may have to set it to 1 hour 45 minutes earlier than the current time.

October Morning Star Chart

Twilight Limits, Nautical and Astronomical

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

Oct  1  Th            Venus: 30.8° E
     1  Th   4:41 PM  Moon Perigee: 369300 km
     2  Fr   7:35 AM  Moon North Dec.: 28° N
     3  Sa   9:25 AM  Last Quarter
     4  Su   7:52 AM  Saturn Opposition
     5  Mo   1:30 AM  Moon-Mars: 1.2° S
     5  Mo   7:06 AM  Moon-Beehive: 0.4° S
     6  Tu   6:18 AM  Moon-Jupiter: 0.2° S
     6  Tu   9:19 PM  Moon Descending Node
     6  Tu  10:57 PM  Moon-Regulus: 0.6° N
     6  Tu  11:59 PM  Mercury-Venus: 5° N
    10  Sa  11:50 AM  New Moon
    10  Sa  11:55 AM  Mars-Beehive: 0.4° S
    11  Su  10:30 PM  Moon-Venus: 3.3° S
    12  Mo   5:59 AM  Mercury Elongation: 25.2° E 
                      (Poor for N. Hemisphere observers
    12  Mo   4:08 PM  Moon-Mercury: 2.3° N
    14  We   4:25 PM  Moon-Antares: 0.5° N
    15  Th  10:45 PM  Moon South Dec.: 27.9° S
    16  Fr   6:56 PM  Moon Apogee: 404600 km
    18  Su  12:13 PM  First Quarter
    21  We   4:53 AM  Moon Ascending Node
    21  We   2:16 PM  Orionid Shower: ZHR = 20
    23  Fr  11:29 PM  Venus Inferior Conjunction
    25  Su  11:12 PM  Full Moon
    27  Tu   8:11 PM  Moon-Pleiades: 1° S
    28  We   1:01 PM  Moon Perigee: 364400 km
    29  Th  12:40 PM  Moon North Dec.: 27.8° N
Nov  1  Su            Venus: 13.9° W

Sky Events Calendar by Fred Espenak and Sumit Dutta (NASA’s GSFC), with modifications by the author.
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
October, 2026    Local time zone: EDT
+-----------------------------------------------------------------------+
| DATE |  SUN     SUN  DAYLIGHT|   TWILIGHT*    |MOON  RISE OR    ILLUM |
|      |  RISE    SET    HOURS |  END    START  |PHASE SET** TIME FRACTN|
+=======================================================================+
|Thu  1| 07:40a  07:23p  11:42 | 08:26p  06:37a |      Rise 10:06p   68%|
|Fri  2| 07:42a  07:21p  11:39 | 08:24p  06:39a |      Rise 11:11p   56%|
|Sat  3| 07:43a  07:19p  11:36 | 08:22p  06:40a |L Qtr Rise 12:25a   45%|
+------+-----------------------+----------------+-----------------------+
|Sun  4| 07:44a  07:17p  11:33 | 08:20p  06:41a |      Rise 01:44a   34%|
|Mon  5| 07:45a  07:15p  11:30 | 08:18p  06:42a |      Rise 03:02a   24%|
|Tue  6| 07:47a  07:13p  11:26 | 08:16p  06:43a |      Rise 04:18a   15%|
|Wed  7| 07:48a  07:12p  11:23 | 08:15p  06:45a |      Rise 05:32a    8%|
|Thu  8| 07:49a  07:10p  11:20 | 08:13p  06:46a |      Rise 06:44a    3%|
|Fri  9| 07:50a  07:08p  11:17 | 08:11p  06:47a |      Rise 07:55a    1%|
|Sat 10| 07:52a  07:06p  11:14 | 08:09p  06:48a |New   Set  06:47p    0%|
+------+-----------------------+----------------+-----------------------+
|Sun 11| 07:53a  07:04p  11:11 | 08:08p  06:50a |      Set  07:09p    2%|
|Mon 12| 07:54a  07:03p  11:08 | 08:06p  06:51a |      Set  07:34p    6%|
|Tue 13| 07:55a  07:01p  11:05 | 08:04p  06:52a |      Set  08:06p   11%|
|Wed 14| 07:57a  06:59p  11:02 | 08:02p  06:53a |      Set  08:44p   18%|
|Thu 15| 07:58a  06:58p  10:59 | 08:01p  06:55a |      Set  09:31p   26%|
|Fri 16| 07:59a  06:56p  10:56 | 07:59p  06:56a |      Set  10:26p   34%|
|Sat 17| 08:00a  06:54p  10:53 | 07:57p  06:57a |      Set  11:28p   44%|
+------+-----------------------+----------------+-----------------------+
|Sun 18| 08:02a  06:52p  10:50 | 07:56p  06:58a |F Qtr Set  12:33a   53%|
|Mon 19| 08:03a  06:51p  10:47 | 07:54p  06:59a |      Set  01:40a   63%|
|Tue 20| 08:04a  06:49p  10:44 | 07:53p  07:01a |      Set  02:48a   72%|
|Wed 21| 08:06a  06:47p  10:41 | 07:51p  07:02a |      Set  03:57a   80%|
|Thu 22| 08:07a  06:46p  10:38 | 07:50p  07:03a |      Set  05:07a   88%|
|Fri 23| 08:08a  06:44p  10:35 | 07:48p  07:04a |      Set  06:20a   94%|
|Sat 24| 08:10a  06:43p  10:33 | 07:47p  07:06a |      Set  07:36a   98%|
+------+-----------------------+----------------+-----------------------+
|Sun 25| 08:11a  06:41p  10:30 | 07:45p  07:07a |      Set  08:56a  100%|
|Mon 26| 08:12a  06:40p  10:27 | 07:44p  07:08a |Full  Rise 06:34p   99%|
|Tue 27| 08:14a  06:38p  10:24 | 07:42p  07:09a |      Rise 07:11p   95%|
|Wed 28| 08:15a  06:37p  10:21 | 07:41p  07:10a |      Rise 08:00p   89%|
|Thu 29| 08:16a  06:35p  10:18 | 07:40p  07:12a |      Rise 09:02p   81%|
|Fri 30| 08:18a  06:34p  10:15 | 07:38p  07:13a |      Rise 10:15p   71%|
|Sat 31| 08:19a  06:32p  10:13 | 07:37p  07:14a |      Rise 11:34p   60%|
+-----------------------------------------------------------------------+
* Nautical Twilight
** Moonrise or moonset, whichever occurs between sunset and sunrise

Generated using my LookingUp for DOS app.