Saturday:
It’s a moonless August morning. The first remnant of dawn has not appeared yet.
Suddenly, you notice a large softly radiant pyramid of light in the east sky.
The base of this ghostly triangle is along the east horizon and the peak
stretches two or three fists held upright and at arm’s length above the horizon
about two hours before sunrise. Don’t be scared. It’s not really a ghost. It is
an effect called the zodiacal light. This light comes from sunlight reflecting
off dust grains in our solar system. The effect is the most visible when the
band of constellations called the zodiac makes a steep angle with the horizon.
You need a clear dark sky with no haze or light pollution to see the zodiacal
light. At its brightest, the zodiacal light rivals the light of the central
Milky Way. This is one of the best times of year to see the zodiacal light in
the morning.
This is
also one of the best times of the year to see meteors. The Perseid meteor
shower peaks early next week. But you should see increased meteor activity
later this week just below the W of the constellation Cassiopeia. This point is
about two and a half fists held upright and at arm’s length above the northeast
horizon at 11 p.m. By dawn, this point is about seven fists above the northeast
horizon
Sunday: Four
in a row will not win in poker. But it makes a winning target in the night
sky. From sunset until about
10:30, Spica, Mars, the moon, and Saturn line up in the southwestern sky. At 10
p.m., the moon is due southwest. Saturn is less than a half a fist to the upper
left of the moon. Mars is about a fist to the lower right of the moon and Spica
is more than a fist to the lower right of Mars.
Monday: The
bright star Vega is nearly straight overhead at 11 p.m.
Tuesday: Had
the script been written a little differently for a well-known Robin Williams
movie, we might have heard Mr. Williams shout, “Goooood Morning Orion the
hunter”. Orion is typically thought of as a winter constellation. But, it makes
its first appearance in the summer sky. The lowest corner of Orion’s body,
represented by the star Saiph (pronounced “safe”), rises at 4:30 a.m., well
before the Sun. By 5 a.m., Orion’s belt is about one fist above the
east-southeast horizon.
Wednesday:
School starts in about a month so it is time to start reviewing your geometric
shapes. Let’s start with the right triangle that is a fist above the
west-southwest horizon at 10 p.m. The bluish star Spica is at the right angle,
in the lower left corner of the triangle. Saturn is a half a fist above Spica
and Mars a fist to the right of Spica.
Thursday: Let’s
all sing the galactic black hole monster song: “D is for dusty, that’s good
enough for me. D is for dusty that’s good enough for me. D is for dusty that’s
good enough for me. Oh dusty, dusty, dusty starts with D.” Astronomers know
that spiral galaxies such as our own have super massive black holes in the
center, black holes that are billions of times the mass of the Sun. They
thought they got to be this massive by mergers where two galaxies collide and
the gas, dust and black holes at the center of each colliding galaxy form a
larger central black hole. But many distant galaxies show no signs of galactic
mergers. Astronomers think the black holes at the center of these galaxies grew
simply by snacking on the gas and dust that comes from supernova explosions and
normal star formation. Just like the Cookie Monster gains weight by snacking on
individual cookies rather than eating a cookie factory. Cookie crumbs, I mean
dust, block your view of the center of our galaxy. It is about one fist above due south at 10 p.m., between the
constellations Sagittarius and Scorpius. For more information, go to http://goo.gl/L9ppJf.
Friday: Venus
is a little less than a half a fist above the east-northeast horizon at 5 a.m.
The
positional information in this column about stars and planets is typically
accurate for the entire week. For up to date information about the night sky,
go to https://nightsky.jpl.nasa.gov/planner.cfm.
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