Saturday: As the rock group Journey once thought of singing, “Wheel in the sky keeps on turnin’. I know where the Dipper’ll be tomorrow.” Every night, the Big Dipper and Cassiopeia make a wheel in the sky that turns around the North Star in a counter clockwise direction. Every year on April 24 at 10:00 p.m., the Big Dipper is straight overhead and W-shaped Cassiopeia is low on the northern horizon. Every year on April 25 at 10:00 p.m., the Big Dipper is straight overhead and W-shaped Cassiopeia is low on the northern horizon. Every year on April 26 at 10:00 p.m., the Big Dipper is straight overhead and W-shaped Cassiopeia is low on the northern horizon. Oh, am I boring you? Of course, there are subtle charges in the position from night to night. Each northern constellation moves about one degree counterclockwise from one night to the next. But this is not going to change their position in the sky drastically over a few days. So, if you know where the Big Dipper is tonight, you DO know where it’ll be tomorrow. If you are really struggling to understand this concept, Don’t Stop Believin’ in yourself. Just keep studying Faithfully.
Sunday: The Moon is taking a tour of the planets for the next few mornings at 5:00 a.m. This morning Saturn is less than a fist to the upper left of the moon, just above the southeastern horizon.
Monday: This morning, the moon, Mars, and Saturn make a small triangle low in the southeastern sky at 5:00 a.m. Mars is about a fist to the upper left of the moon and Saturn is about a fist to the upper right of the moon.
Tuesday: Mercury is one fist above the west-northwest horizon at 9:00 p.m. Venus is a half a fist above the eastern horizon at 5:00 a.m. These objects are two of our closest celestial neighbors. One hundred years ago tonight, the astronomers Heber Curtis and Harlow Shapley were debating the distances of some of our farthest neighbors: galaxies. Curtis argued that the universe consisted of many galaxies millions of light years away. Shapley thought that the spiral structures seen in telescopes were actually a part of the Milky Way. They also had different views on the size of the Milky Way. Learn more about their debate, called the Great Debate, at https://stardate.org/radio/program/2020-04-24. Learn more about the Milky Way by watching the center of it rise over the southeastern horizon at about 1:00 a.m.
Wednesday: Sure, it’s fun to go to a star party. But what if the star party could come to you? Today at 20:00 UTC, or 1:00 p.m. Pacific Daylight Time, the Stars for All Virtual Star Party will start at the Virtual Telescope project. Watch at https://www.virtualtelescope.eu/2022/03/31/stars-for-all-online-cosmic-journey-27-april-2022/.
Thursday: In this busy world, it is important to know what time it is. We have many devices that give us the time. A phone. A computer. A watch. But who has time to build a phone, computer or even a watch. Not you. But everyone has enough time to build a simple Sun Clock. All you need is a pencil, a compass and a print out of the clock template. Go to https://www.exploratorium.edu/science_explorer/sunclock.html for more information.
Friday: Orion stands low in the southwestern sky. At 9:00 p.m., the middle of Orion’s belt is one and a half fists held upright and at arm’s length above the west-southwest horizon. And talk about belt tightening! Alnilam, the middle star in the belt, is losing mass at a rate of about 100 thousand trillion tons a day. That’s a 1 followed by 17 zeros tons per day.
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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