12/06/2017 – Ephemeris – Where did all the evening planets go?
Ephemeris for Wednesday, December 6th. The Sun will rise at 8:04. It’ll be up for 8 hours and 57 minutes, setting at 5:02. The Moon, 3 days past full, will rise at 8:43 this evening.
Let’s take our weekly look at the bright planets. Saturn and Mercury are very close together, but too low after sunset to spot from up North here. Mercury will set at 5:50, while Saturn will set 9 minutes later. While Uranus and Neptune are evening planets, they require binoculars or a telescope to spot. (This is beyond the scope of this program, which is geared to naked eye observing or easy things to find and observe with binoculars or a small telescope). The morning sky is now host to three planets, though Venus, the brightest will rise close to sun will rise at 7:24 this morning. It’s way on the other side of the Sun, and it will pass behind the Sun in superior conjunction a month from today. At 7 this morning Jupiter is bright, low in the east-southeast, while Mars, the Red Planet is just left of the brighter star Spica, which has a bluish hue. They are higher than Jupiter and to the southeast. Mars will rise tomorrow morning at 4:03. Jupiter will rise more than an hour later at 5:14.
The times given are for the Traverse City/Interlochen area of Michigan. They may be different for your location.
Addendum
Stellarium is unable to display Mercury or Saturn in twilight for tonight.
The Moon as it might be seen in binoculars at 9:30 p.m. December 6, 2017. Created using Stellarium.
Mars and Jupiter in the morning at 7 a.m. December 7, 2017. Click on the image to enlarge. Created using Stellarium.
Jupiter and moons on the mornings of December 6th and 7th, 2017. Ganymede and Europa will transit the planet on the 7th later in the morning and in the afternoon to be visible for folks west of here. Created using Cartes du Ciel (Sky Charts).
Planets at sunset and sunrise of a single night starting with sunset on the right on December 6, 2017. The night ends on the left with sunrise on the 7th. Click on the image to enlarge. Created using my LookingUp program.
12/05/2017 – Ephemeris – A flat Earth, come on, really?
Ephemeris for Tuesday, December 5th. The Sun will rise at 8:03. It’ll be up for 8 hours and 58 minutes, setting at 5:02. The Moon, 2 days past full, will rise at 7:35 this evening.
Last Friday night I gave a talk to the Grand Traverse Astronomical Society about the world view of mostly ancient peoples. They uniformly believed in a flat Earth. This includes the world of the Bible. The Greek geographer Eratosthenes calculated the circumference of the Earth way back in the third century BC. A flat Earth would normally be the conclusion of a person who never went more than a few hundred miles from home, especially in an east-west direction. However if one went north or south, the stars would slowly change. Head south and new stars would appear above the southern horizon, and in the north, stars that would never set would now set. Polaris would drop lower in the North. The round Earth is the simplest explanation.
The times given are for the Traverse City/Interlochen area of Michigan. They may be different for your location.
Addendum
Here’s an extension from my notes:
Those who profess to believe in a flat Earth tend to be Christian and believe that the Bible is literally true even to the physical description of the world found in its pages. Therefore the basis for the flat Earth is the Bible.
While there are those who have always believed in a flat earth, Eratosthenes pretty much put killed that notion in the 3rd century BC when he found that there was a 7.2 degree difference in the altitude of the Sun at local noon on the summer solstice between Syene and Alexandria in Egypt. The distance between the two cities was about 800 km, and 7.2 degrees is 1/50th that of a circle, so the Earth would have been 50 X 800 or 40,000 kilometers or 25,000 miles* in circumference. This of course meant that the Earth was round! The units he used were stadia, whose exact length has been in doubt.
Flat earth theories started to proliferate in the mid-19th century when most of the Earth’s coastlines had at least been mapped, though the polar regions had yet to be breached.
Zetetic Astronomy. Earth not a globe! An experimental inquiry… by Samuel Birly Rowbotham, 1865
Zetetic Cosmology: Conclusive evidence that the world is not a rotating-revolving-globe, but a stationary flat pane circle, second edition, by “Rectangle”, 1899. Rectangle is a pseudonym of T. Winship
These can be found on Archive.org.
The latest reincarnation of the Flat Earth Society was started in 2013. Their web page and wiki is here: https://www.tfes.org/.
The Flat Earth by Trekky0623 at English Wikipedia, placed in the Public Domain.
Features:
- North Pole in the center.
- The firmament rotates around it.
- There is no South Pole.
- There are impassable mountains in Antarctica at the end of the Earth.
- Wouldn’t the Sun be always up for everybody?
- Apparently, the Sun orbits over the flat Earth in circles between the Tropic of Cancer and Tropic of Capricorn to produce the seasons.
- The Sun is 3000 miles away and is only about 30 miles in diameter.
- It shines like a spotlight over the earth.
- The moon is somewhat lower than the sun and can cause solar eclipses.
- The flat Earth’s shadow cannot cause a lunar eclipse, since the Moon is on the same side of the Earth as the Sun. The eclipse is caused by a “shadow object” that we can’t see that comes between the Sun and the Moon.
It boggles my mind how anyone in this day and age, who travels a lot cannot believe that the Earth is a spheroid. Maybe no one looks up anymore. Perhaps I’m just an oddball astronomer who like to look up and see the stars shift as I move south or north. In fact I plan on it when I travel.
* corrected this value from the original post
12/04/2017 – Ephemeris – Orion rising in the moonlight
Ephemeris for Monday, December 4th. The Sun will rise at 8:02. It’ll be up for exactly 9 hours, setting at 5:02. The Moon, 1 day past full, will rise at 6:32 this evening.
Now that the Moon is quite bright and making the fainter stars in the constellations harder to find, let’s look at one of the bright stars of Winter. Tonight at 8 p.m. the bright reddish star Betelgeuse is low in the east, but will be rising higher and moving slightly southward, as the rest of the bright stars in its constellation of Orion the hunter also clear the horizon. To its right are a nearly vertical line of three equally spaced stars, Orion’s belt. Betelgeuse is in Orion’s shoulder. The name Betelgeuse is a corruption of the Arabic phrase “Armpit of the Central One”, although there’s some debate about that translation. Betelgeuse is maybe only 7 million years old, but due to its great mass of up to 20 times that of the Sun, is already dying.
The times given are for the Traverse City/Interlochen area of Michigan. They may be different for your location.
Addendum
Orion rising in the light of a super moo at 8 p.m.,, about 3 hours after sunset, December 4, 2017. Created using Stellarium.
12/01/2017 – Ephemeris – A look at how the ancients saw their world at the Rogers Observatory tonight
Ephemeris for Friday, December 1st. The Sun will rise at 7:59. It’ll be up for 9 hours and 4 minutes, setting at 5:03. The Moon, 2 days before full, will set at 6:22 tomorrow morning.
This evening’s meeting of the Grand Traverse Astronomical Society starting at 8 p.m. at Northwestern Michigan College’s Rogers Observatory will be yours truly’s biennial December program on mostly Ancient Cosmologies, a look at the cosmologies or world view of many mostly pre-scientific cultures, including the Biblical world view. We’ll see how these ideas are alike and different for cultures spread across distance and time. I’ll finish with a modern unscientific and throwback cosmology of the believers in a flat Earth. At 9 p.m. there will be a star party at the observatory, and another program if it’s cloudy. All are welcome. The observatory is located south of Traverse City on Birmley Road.
The times given are for the Traverse City/Interlochen area of Michigan. They may be different for your location.
11/30/2017 – Ephemeris – Previewing December skies
Ephemeris for Thursday, November 30th. The Sun will rise at 7:58. It’ll be up for 9 hours and 5 minutes, setting at 5:03. The Moon, 3 days before full, will set at 5:07 tomorrow morning.
Tomorrow starts the last month of the 2017. We are now in the holiday season and about to celebrate the southernmost travel of the Sun in the sky and its return northward. The Sun will stop its travel south, the winter solstice on the 21st at 11:29 a.m. That will make that day the shortest day in terms of daylight hours. However the earliest sunset and latest sunrise don’t coincide with that date. The reason is the Earth is closer to the sun than average and moving faster in its orbit of the sun than it normally does. It skews the sunrise and sunset times, making them later than they would be on average. That makes the sunset times bottom out about December 9th. at 5:02 p.m. And that latest sunrise will top out on January 2nd at 8:20 a.m.
The times given are for the Traverse City/Interlochen area of Michigan. They may be different for your location.
Addenda
December Evening Sky Chart
Star Chart for December 2017 (9 p.m. December 15, 2017). Created using my LookingUp program. Click on image to enlarge.
The planets and stars are plotted for the 15th at 9 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. (An hour 45 minutes behind our daylight saving time meridian. during EDT and 45 minutes behind our daylight standard time meridian. during EST). To duplicate the star positions on a planisphere you may have to set it to 1 hour 45 minutes (Daylight Time) or 45 minutes (Standard Time) earlier than the current time if you are near your time meridian.
Note the chart times of 9 p.m. and 6 a.m. are for the 15th. For each week before the 15th add ½ hour. For each week after the 15th subtract ½ hour. The planet positions are updated each Wednesday on this blog. For planet positions on dates other than the 15th, check the Wednesday planet posts on this blog.
December Morning Star Chart
Star Chart for December 2017 mornings based on 6 a.m. December 15th. Created using my LookingUp program. Click on image to enlarge.
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.
- Follow the arc of the handle of the Big Dipper to the star Arcturus.
- The Summer Triangle is in red
- GemR is the Geminid meteor shower radiant. Peaks on December 14th, the Moon will not interfere this year.
Twilight
Evening nautical twilight ends at 6:16 p.m. EST on the 1st, decreasing to 6:21 p.m. EDT on the 31st.
Evening astronomical twilight ends at 6:51 p.m. EST on the 1st, decreasing to 6:56 p.m. EDT on the 31st.
Morning astronomical twilight starts at 6:20 a.m. EST on the 1st, and increasing to 6:35 a.m. EDT on the 31st.
Morning nautical twilight starts at 6:56 a.m. EST on the 1st, and increasing to 7:10 a.m. EDT on the 31st.
NASA Calendar of Planetary Events
Date Time Event
Dec 01 Fr Venus: 9.4° W
03 Su 8:00 am Moon-Aldebaran: 0.8° S
03 Su 10:47 am Full Moon
04 Mo 3:42 am Moon Perigee: 357500 km
05 Tu 6:43 am Moon North Dec.: 20° N
07 Th 4:30 am Moon-Beehive: 2.5° N
07 Th 7:39 pm Moon Ascending Node
08 Fr 5:25 pm Moon-Regulus: 0.7° S
10 Su 2:51 am Last Quarter
12 Tu 8:40 pm Mercury Inferior Conjunction with the Sun
13 We 11:27 am Moon-Mars: 4.5° S
14 Th 1:07 am Geminid Meteor Shower: ZHR = 120!
14 Th 9:26 am Moon-Jupiter: 4.7° S
18 Mo 1:31 am New Moon
18 Mo 8:27 am Moon Apogee: 406600 km
19 Tu 4:31 am Moon South Dec.: 20.1° S
21 Th 11:29 am Winter Solstice
21 Th 3:18 pm Saturn Conjunction with the Sun
22 Fr 5:04 am Moon Descending Node
22 Fr 10:00 am Ursid Meteor Shower: ZHR = 10
Note: The Ursid radiant is near the Little Dipper’s
bowl
26 Tu 4:20 am First Quarter
30 Sa 7:25 pm Moon-Aldebaran: 0.7° S
Jan 01 Mo Venus: 1.9° W
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 an 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, 2017 Local time zone: EST +-----------------------------------------------------------------------+ | DATE | SUN SUN DAYLIGHT| TWILIGHT* |MOON RISE OR ILLUM | | | RISE SET HOURS | END START |PHASE SET** TIME FRACTN| +=======================================================================+ |Fri 1| 08:00a 05:03p 09:03 | 06:12p 06:50a | Set 06:22a 96%| |Sat 2| 08:01a 05:03p 09:01 | 06:12p 06:51a | Set 07:38a 99%| +------+-----------------------+----------------+-----------------------+ |Sun 3| 08:02a 05:02p 09:00 | 06:12p 06:52a |Full Rise 05:36p 100%| |Mon 4| 08:03a 05:02p 08:59 | 06:12p 06:53a | Rise 06:32p 97%| |Tue 5| 08:04a 05:02p 08:57 | 06:12p 06:54a | Rise 07:35p 92%| |Wed 6| 08:05a 05:02p 08:56 | 06:12p 06:55a | Rise 08:43p 84%| |Thu 7| 08:06a 05:02p 08:55 | 06:12p 06:56a | Rise 09:54p 75%| |Fri 8| 08:07a 05:02p 08:54 | 06:12p 06:57a | Rise 11:04p 64%| |Sat 9| 08:08a 05:02p 08:53 | 06:12p 06:58a | Rise 12:13a 54%| +------+-----------------------+----------------+-----------------------+ |Sun 10| 08:09a 05:02p 08:52 | 06:12p 06:59a |L Qtr Rise 01:19a 43%| |Mon 11| 08:10a 05:02p 08:51 | 06:12p 06:59a | Rise 02:23a 33%| |Tue 12| 08:11a 05:02p 08:51 | 06:12p 07:00a | Rise 03:25a 24%| |Wed 13| 08:11a 05:02p 08:50 | 06:12p 07:01a | Rise 04:27a 16%| |Thu 14| 08:12a 05:02p 08:49 | 06:13p 07:02a | Rise 05:27a 10%| |Fri 15| 08:13a 05:02p 08:49 | 06:13p 07:02a | Rise 06:26a 5%| |Sat 16| 08:14a 05:03p 08:49 | 06:13p 07:03a | Rise 07:22a 2%| +------+-----------------------+----------------+-----------------------+ |Sun 17| 08:14a 05:03p 08:48 | 06:14p 07:04a | Rise 08:16a 0%| |Mon 18| 08:15a 05:03p 08:48 | 06:14p 07:04a |New Set 05:46p 1%| |Tue 19| 08:16a 05:04p 08:48 | 06:14p 07:05a | Set 06:34p 3%| |Wed 20| 08:16a 05:04p 08:48 | 06:15p 07:05a | Set 07:27p 6%| |Thu 21| 08:17a 05:05p 08:48 | 06:15p 07:06a | Set 08:23p 12%| |Fri 22| 08:17a 05:05p 08:48 | 06:16p 07:06a | Set 09:22p 19%| |Sat 23| 08:18a 05:06p 08:48 | 06:16p 07:07a | Set 10:22p 27%| +------+-----------------------+----------------+-----------------------+ |Sun 24| 08:18a 05:06p 08:48 | 06:17p 07:07a | Set 11:24p 36%| |Mon 25| 08:18a 05:07p 08:48 | 06:18p 07:08a | Set 12:28a 46%| |Tue 26| 08:19a 05:08p 08:49 | 06:18p 07:08a |F Qtr Set 01:35a 56%| |Wed 27| 08:19a 05:08p 08:49 | 06:19p 07:08a | Set 02:43a 67%| |Thu 28| 08:19a 05:09p 08:50 | 06:20p 07:09a | Set 03:55a 77%| |Fri 29| 08:19a 05:10p 08:50 | 06:20p 07:09a | Set 05:08a 86%| |Sat 30| 08:19a 05:11p 08:51 | 06:21p 07:09a | Set 06:22a 93%| +------+-----------------------+----------------+-----------------------+ |Sun 31| 08:20a 05:12p 08:52 | 06:22p 07:09a | Set 07:32a 98%| +-----------------------------------------------------------------------+ * Nautical Twilight ** Moonrise or moonset, whichever occurs between sunset and sunrise
11/29/2017 – Ephemeris – The Bright planets this week
Ephemeris for Wednesday, November 29th. The Sun will rise at 7:57. It’ll be up for 9 hours and 7 minutes, setting at 5:04. The Moon, 3 days past first quarter, will set at 3:54 tomorrow morning.
Let’s take our weekly look at the bright planets. Mercury is dropping back to the Sun and is fading as its phase changes to a crescent It will be below and left of Saturn tonight and actually brighter than Saturn. Saturn is sinking low in the southwestern sky. It is becoming harder to spot each evening. Tonight it will set at 6:24 p.m. The morning sky is now host to three planets, though Venus, the brightest will rise at 7:03 this morning and will be fighting twilight as it rises. It’s way on the other side of the Sun, and very tiny in telescopes, though nearly fully illuminated. It’s 156 million miles (251 million km) away. First to rise in the morning is Mars which will rise in the east at 4:07 a.m. tomorrow, Jupiter, will follow and rise at 5:34 a.m. tomorrow.
The times given are for the Traverse City/Interlochen area of Michigan. They may be different for your location.
Addendum
Mercury and Saturn at 5:45 p.m., about 45 minutes after sunset, November 29, 2017. Click on the image to enlarge. Created using Stellarium.
The Moon as it might be seen in binoculars at 7 p.m., November 29, 2017. Created using Stellarium.
Mars and Jupiter at 7 a.m., November 30, 2017. Created using Stellarium.
Jupiter and its 4 Galilean moons as they might be seen in a telescope at 7 a.m. November 30, 2017. Created using Cartes du Ciel (Sky Charts).
Planets at sunset and sunrise of a single night starting with sunset on the right on November 29, 2017. The night ends on the left with sunrise on the 30th. Click on the image to enlarge. Created using my LookingUp program.
11/28/2017 – Ephemeris – Though it appears bright, the Moon is pretty dirty
Ephemeris for Tuesday, November 28th. The Sun will rise at 7:56. It’ll be up for 9 hours and 8 minutes, setting at 5:04. The Moon, 2 days past first quarter, will set at 2:44 tomorrow morning.
The Moon tonight is a waxing gibbous phase, and each night until it’s full it will get brighter and brighter, drowning out the fainter stars. The Moon is almost too bright to comfortably view in a telescope. One can get a moon filter for the eyepiece, or wear sunglasses or opt for higher magnification. It is after all daytime on the Moon and it’s essentially the same distance from the Sun as we are. A saving grace is that the Moon isn’t white. It’s a dirty gray, reflecting on average only 13.6 percent of the light it gets from the Sun. Just think how bright it would appear if it were 100% reflective, over 7 times brighter than it appears now. The face of the Moon hasn’t appeared to change at all since before we landed there 48 years ago.
The times given are for the Traverse City/Interlochen area of Michigan. They may be different for your location.
Addendum
Moon albedo comparison. Actually about 50% vs. 100%. The Moon is less reflectant than that.. Sunday’s super moon image created via Stellarium.
11/27/2017 – Ephemeris – Ross 128b the second closest known exoplanet
Ephemeris for Monday, November 27th. The Sun will rise at 7:54. It’ll be up for 9 hours and 10 minutes, setting at 5:05. The Moon, 1 day past first quarter, will set at 1:37 tomorrow morning.
The second closest exoplanet to the solar system has been discovered. That was earlier this year around a star named Ross 128. It’s name is Ross 128 small letter b. The star Ross 128 is a nearby red dwarf star, whose distance is a shade under 11 light years away, The star is thought to be twice the age of the Sun, We’d be in big trouble if the Sun were that old, but Ross 128 is just getting started. The exoplanet is about 35% more massive than the Earth. It’s distance from the star averages 4.6 million miles and its year is a bit under 10 Earth days. At that rate I’d be over 28 hundred years old. Astronomers don’t know the size or the density of the planet since it doesn’t pass in front of its star. These measurements will have to wait on larger telescopes.
The times given are for the Traverse City/Interlochen area of Michigan. They may be different for your location.
Addendum
The star Ross 128. It’s actually much fainter than is suggested here in the diagram from Sky and Telescope magazine’s website.. Mars’ position is for November 2017.
11/24/2017 – Ephemeris – Fomalhaut, the loneliest star, has a little buddy
Ephemeris for Friday, November 24th. The Sun will rise at 7:51. It’ll be up for 9 hours and 15 minutes, setting at 5:07. The Moon, 2 days before first quarter, will set at 10:30 this evening.
The lonely bright star low in the south at 8 p.m. these evenings is Fomalhaut the harbinger of autumn in my book, and about to leave as winter approaches. Fomalhaut means fishes mouth and is located at the head of Piscis Austrinus, a very dim constellation. Fomalhaut is a young white star only about 400 million years old with a disk of dust surrounding it. Near an outer dust ring, 15 years ago the Hubble Space Telescope discovered a spot. Four years later astronomers discovered that the spot moved along the dust lane and announced the first direct discovery of an exoplanet. In 2010 and 2012 the planet now dubbed Fomalhaut b or Dagon was observed again and it really does orbit Fomalhaut in a very eccentric orbit.
The times given are for the Traverse City/Interlochen area of Michigan. They may be different for your location.
Addendum
Fomalhaut in the south at 8 p.m. on November evenings. Created using Stellarium.
Fomalhaut b and it’s path around its star. Credit: NASA, ESA, and P. Kalas (University of California, Berkeley and SETI Institute)
11/23/2017 – Ephemeris – Mercury is at it’s greatest eastern elongation tonight
Ephemeris for Thanksgiving Day, Thursday, November 23rd. The Sun will rise at 7:49. It’ll be up for 9 hours and 17 minutes, setting at 5:07. The Moon, 3 days before first quarter, will set at 9:33 this evening.
Mercury is going to reach its greatest elongation or apparent separation from the Sun this evening. It will be 22 degrees east of the Sun. Because Mercury is the closest planet to the Sun, it is never seen far from it. And because it has the most eccentric orbit of all the planets its greatest elongations are between 17 and 27 degrees from the Sun. Other than that the best times of the year to see Mercury are late winter and early spring evenings and late summer and early autumn mornings. Being an autumn evening means that Mercury is almost too low to spot after sunset. The southern hemisphere is in spring, so Mercury tonight will be much easier seen. Also their best view is when Mercury is farther from the Sun.
The times given are for the Traverse City/Interlochen area of Michigan. They may be different for your location.
Addendum
There are rather clinical charts. The horizontal line through the W (western compass point) is the horizon. Grid marks are 10 degrees apart.
Diagram showing the poor placement of Mercury at greatest eastern elongation tonight in autumn from 45 degrees north latitude. Mercury is about 8.5 degrees altitude at sunset. The orange line is the ecliptic, the path pf the Sun on the celestial sphere. Created using Stellarium.
Diagram showing the great placement of Mercury at greatest eastern elongation tonight in southern hemisphere spring from 45 degrees south latitude. Mercury is nearly 19 degrees altitude at sunset. The orange line is the ecliptic, the path pf the Sun on the celestial sphere. Created using Stellarium.
