The Ellensburg, WA sky for the week of November 30, 2024

Saturday: Is your favorite astronomy-loving relative asking for a telescope this Christmas? Before reaching for your credit card, read this guide to choosing your first telescope, available at http://goo.gl/5oXmGj. If cost is an issue, look no further than this article about low-cost telescopes https://goo.gl/8yyddy. These are not cheap telescopes. They are simple, low-cost, easy to use telescopes that your future astronomer will still use for quick observing sessions long after she has purchased a much larger instrument for richer viewing. If you want to give a gag astronomy gift to someone who really bugs you, give them a copy of this column. After such a dud “gift”, you’ll never hear from them again. And that may be the best gift of all.

Sunday: Lieutenant Worf, the Klingon Starfleet officer on Star Trek: The Next Generation, might say “Today is a good day to die.” But Deneb, the bright supergiant star in Cygnus the Swan would say “two million years from now is a good day to die.” This may seem like a long time. But, compared to the lifespan of most stars, two million years from now is as close as tomorrow. For example, the Sun will last about five billion years. Small stars known as red dwarfs may last trillions of years. Prepare your astronomically short goodbyes to Deneb tonight at 11:00 when it is about two fists above due northwest.

Monday: Have you been online shopping all weekend? Do you need an evening sky break? You deserve a big reward so make it a double. A Double Cluster. The Double Cluster, also known as h and Chi Persei, consists of two young open star clusters in the constellation Perseus. Of course, young is a relative term as these clusters are about 13 million years old. Each cluster is spread out over an area about the same size as the full moon. To the naked eye, the Double Cluster shines with a steady, fuzzy glow. Binoculars resolve dozens of individual stars in the clusters. The Double Cluster is five and a half fists above the northeastern horizon at 6:00 p.m., about a fist below the sideways “W” of Cassiopeia and three fists above the bright star Capella.

Tuesday: Venus is one and a half fists above the southwestern horizon at 5:00 p.m. Saturn is three fists above the south-southeastern horizon at this time.

Wednesday: It’s getting too cold to see frogs in the wild. But this is a great time to see frogs in the sky. Ancient Arabs referred to the stars that we now call Fomalhaut and Diphda as Ad-difdi al-awwal and Ad-difda at-tani. This means the first frog and the second frog, respectively. Both frogs are low in the southern sky at 6:00 p.m. Fomalhaut is nearly one and a half fists above due south. The slightly dimmer Diphda is two fists above the south-southeast horizon.

Thursday: While you were looking through your underwear drawer for clean socks, some citizen scientists were looking through sky maps obtained by robotic telescopes to find brown dwarfs. The project, called Backyard Worlds: Cool Neighbors, allows anyone with a computer and internet connection to search through thousands of images to find these strange objects that are midway between being classified as large planets and small stars. Some brown dwarfs can have surface temperatures of thousands of degrees Celsius, the recently discovered ones are cooler than the boiling point of water and may even have clouds of water vapor! Read more about the discovery and how you can participate in this project at https://noirlab.edu/public/blog/newly-launched-backyard-worlds/.

Friday: Jupiter is four and a half fists above the east-southeastern horizon at 9:00 p.m. Mars is one fist above the east-northeastern horizon at this time.

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. All times are Pacific Time unless noted.

The Ellensburg, WA sky for the week of November 23, 2024

Saturday: We are just a few days away from the earliest sunsets of the year in Ellensburg, meaning it is getting dark as early as possible. (No, the earliest sunsets are not on the first day of winter.) Thus, it is a good time to learn how to quantify the darkness of the sky. First find the Great Square, the main part of the constellation Pegasus. It is six fists held upright and at arm’s length above due south at 7:30 p.m. Find the dimmest star that you can see inside or near the square. Then compare that star to the chart at  https://www.skyandtelescope.com/observing/how-dark-is-your-night-sky/. The larger the magnitude number, the dimmer the star. When the sky is exceptionally dark, you can see more stars and more interesting deep-sky objects such as star clusters and nebulae.

Sunday: Mercury is less than a half a fist above the southwest horizon and Venus is about a fist above the south-southwestern horizon at 4:45 p.m.

Monday: “Hey baby! What’s your sign?”

“Ophiuchus, of course”

The Sun is in the same part of the sky as the stars of Ophiuchus from this week to mid-December. This is what astrologers mean when they say the Sun is “in” a constellation. Thus, if you were born between these dates, you should be an Ophiuchus. The fact that the horoscopes never list Ophiuchus is a major flaw of astrology. Astrology says that some of our characteristics are based on the location of the Sun at our birth. How can astrologers leave out three weeks from their system? That is like a scientist saying she can explain the results of her experiment every month of the year except early December. Ophiuchus was a mythical healer who was a forerunner to Hippocrates. According to myth, he could raise people from the dead. Maybe that is why he is ignored by astrology. Raising people from the dead is much less impressive than giving spot-on advice such as “Today is a good day to watch your finances.”

The bright stars of Ophiuchus rise just before the Sun. Rasalhague (pronounced Ras’-al-hay’-gwee), the brightest star, is just above the east-northeastern horizon at 6:30 a.m.

Tuesday: Deneb Kaitos, Arabic for whale’s tail, is two and a half fists above due south at 8:30 p.m. This is the brightest star in the constellation Cetus the sea monster. Or, if you are less prone to hyperbole, Cetus the whale.

Wednesday: Spica is right above the waning Moon crescent moon, two fists above the southeastern horizon at 6:30 a.m. This is a good opportunity to convince yourself that you can see stars other than the Sun during the day. Note the relative orientation of Spica compared to the Moon. Then, right after sunrise, look at the Moon with binoculars. You will see Spica in that same location compared to the Moon.

Thursday: Some of us have a lot to be thankful for on Thanksgiving. But, probably not as much as Andromeda had to be thankful for. According to Greek mythology, the beautiful princess Andromeda was chained to a rock next to the ocean. Cetus the sea monster was about to devour her to punish her family. Her mother Queen Cassiopeia and her father King Cepheus didn’t know what to do. It seemed that all was lost. But along came Andromeda’s boyfriend, the great warrior Perseus. Even though Perseus’ standing as the son of King Zeus and the slayer of Medusa was probably enough to win Andromeda under normal circumstances, Andromeda’s impending death-by-sea-monster was not a normal circumstance. So, Perseus drove his sword into the sea monster’s neck and killed it. This was the first time in recorded history that a set of parents actually welcomed an uninvited Thanksgiving visit from the boyfriend. Perseus is about five fists above the east-northeastern horizon and Andromeda is about seven fists above the east-southeastern horizon at 7:00 p.m.

Friday: Lacerta, the faint lizard constellation, is straight overhead at 6:00 p.m. It was named by the Polish astronomer Johannes Hevelius in 1687 to fill the space between the much brighter and well-defined constellations Pegasus, Andromeda, Cassiopeia, Cepheus, and Cygnus going clockwise from the constellation just south of Lacerta.

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. All times are Pacific Time unless noted.

The Ellensburg, WA sky for the week of November 16, 2024

Saturday: Mercury will be as far away from the Sun in the sky as it will get during this orbital cycle. This "farthest away" point is known as the planet's greatest elongation. Since Mercury is in the evening sky, it is east of the Sun so this occurrence is called the greatest eastern elongation. This evening will be the best evening to observe Mercury for the next few weeks. Mercury is just above the southwestern horizon at 5:00 p.m. Over the next two weeks, Mercury will move toward the Sun in the sky. By December 10, it will be visible in the morning sky just before sunrise.

The Leonid meteor shower peaks tonight and tomorrow morning. There will be increased activity for the next few days. These meteors appear to come from a point in the constellation Leo the lion. This point is about five and a half fists above the southeastern horizon at 5:00 a.m. The Moon is just after full so its light will interfere with the dimmer meteors. The Leonid meteors are particles from the tail of Comet Tempel-Tuttle, a comet discovered by Ernst Tempel and Horace Parnell Tuttle in 1866. These are exceptionally fast-moving meteors – over 150,000 miles per hour! Go to https://earthsky.org/astronomy-essentials/everything-you-need-to-know-leonid-meteor-shower/ to read everything you need to know about the Leonid meteor shower. As your mother might say, dress warm and sit in a comfortable chair for maximum enjoyment.

Sunday: Uranus is in opposition tonight. That doesn’t mean Uranus is spending the night saying, “no”. It means tonight is the best night of the year to observe Uranus. It is five and a half fists held upright and at arm’s length above due southeast at 10:00 p.m. You’ll need binoculars to see it. First find the Pleiades, a little cup shaped open star cluster a little more than five and a half fists above the southeastern at 10:00 p.m. Move the binoculars so the Pleiades is on the far left of your field of view. Uranus will be the brightest object on the far right of your field of view. Revisit that part of the sky for the next few nights. Uranus Is the point of light that will change position from night to night, moving rightward with respect to the background stars.

Monday: “It’s a wonderful day in the neighborhood.” Constellations can be considered neighborhoods in the nighttime sky. But the stars in those constellations are not necessarily neighbors in real life. For example, the bright stars in the constellation Cassiopeia range from 19 light years to over 10,000 light years away from Earth. One constellation that consists of real neighbors is Ursa Major. Or, more specifically, the Big Dipper. Five stars in the Big Dipper are all moving in the same direction in space, are about the same age, and are all about 80 light years from Earth. “Please won’t you be my neighbor?” Skat, the third brightest star in the constellation Aquarius is a neighbor to these five Big Dipper stars, all of which are about 30 light years from each other. They are thought to have originated in the same nebula about 500 million years ago. Just like human children do, these child stars are slowly moving away from home. Skat is about three fists above due south at 7:00 p.m. The much brighter Fomalhaut is a fist and a half below Skat. And it’s not fun being below Skat. 

Tuesday: Mars is less than a fist below the Moon, low in the east-northeastern sky at 10:00 p.m. They will stay in approximately that orientation throughout the night.

Wednesday: Are you thankful that you live in a solar system with multiple planets? You should be. A giant planet like Jupiter cleans up planetary debris that could have collided with Earth and hindered the formation of complex life. Any inhabitants of the planets orbiting Upsilon Andromedae are thankful for this, as well. Upsilon Andromedae, a star in the constellation Andromeda, was the first Sun-like star discovered to have multiple planets orbiting it. So far, all its discovered planets are giant planets like Jupiter. But the system is likely to also have smaller planets. The dim star, but certainly not its planets, is barely visible straight overhead at 9:00 p.m. Jupiter is three and a half fists above due east at this time. Saturn is three fists above the south-southwest horizon.

Thursday: Have you ever sat around waiting for a long-distance call from another state? Another country? How about another star system? In 2019, astronomers thought they heard a radio signal from a planet orbiting Proxima Centauri, our Sun’s nearest neighbor at about 4.2 light years away. This signal showed many signs of being extraterrestrial in origin, including coming from a specific location in the sky, having a pure tone, and changing in frequency like something moving exactly towards or exactly away from the Earth. However, a more recent analysis showed that the signal was more like a crank call. Read more about the discovery and undiscovery at https://skyandtelescope.org/astronomy-news/the-true-nature-of-the-candidate-et-signal-from-proxima-centauri/. Proxima Centauri is part of the three-star Alpha Centauri system, the third brightest star in the sky. You need to go down to the southern tip of Texas or Florida to see Alpha Centauri.

Friday: Venus is one fist above the south-southwestern horizon at 5:00 p.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. All times are Pacific Time unless noted.

The Ellensburg, WA sky for the week of November 9, 2024

Saturday: While Stonehenge is an ancient burial ground visited by religious people for thousands of years, MIThenge is an 825-foot-long hallway on the campus of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology visited by the Sun’s rays twice a year. Every year in November and January, the setting Sun lines up with a narrow window at the end of the long hall and the light shines down to the opposite end. This season’s alignment is from November 9-11 at about 4:20 pm. For more information, visit http://goo.gl/0hwFQf or visit MIT. While you are at it, challenge yourself to find a similar alignment in your neighborhood.

Sunday: Are you planning to open your Martinmas gifts tomorrow? Martinmas is a holiday in many parts of the world commemorating Saint Martin of Tours. He was buried on November 11, 397. What does this have to do with astronomy? Not much except that the celebration on November 11 often doubles as a cross-quarter day celebration, a day that is halfway between an equinox and a solstice. Also, according to an agricultural calendar, November 11 marks the practical beginning of winter.

You can get a BOGO - buy one, get one - solar system gift tonight. Saturn is right above the moon. They are three fists above the south-southeastern horizon at 6:00 p.m. They will remain close together throughout the night.

Monday: The Northern Taurid meteor shower peaks tonight around midnight. These are slow moving meteors that result in the occasional fireball. The Taurid meteor showers produce a few bright meteors every hour. The Waning Gibbous Moon will obscure the dim meteors until it sets at about 2:00 a.m. These meteors appear to come from a point in Taurus the bull, near the open star cluster called the Hyades. This point is about six and a half fists held upright and at arm’s length above the southern horizon at midnight. You can follow this point throughout the night, as it will remain one and a half fists to the right of the V-shaped Hyades Cluster with its bright star Aldebaran (pronounced Al-deb’-a-ran). Meteors are tiny rocks that burn up in the atmosphere when the Earth runs into them. The source of this shower is the asteroid 2004 TG10. Go to https://earthsky.org/astronomy-essentials/taurid-meteors-all-you-need-to-know/ for more information.

Tuesday: The bright planet Venus is about a fist above the southwestern horizon at 5:15 p.m.

Wednesday: Lieutenant Worf, the Klingon Starfleet officer on Star Trek: The Next Generation, might say “Today is a good day to die.” But Deneb, the bright supergiant star in Cygnus the Swan would say “two million years from now is a good day to die.” This may seem like a long time. But, compared to the lifespan of most stars, two million years from now is as close as tomorrow. For example, the Sun will last about five billion years. Small stars known as red dwarfs may last trillions of years. Prepare your astronomically short goodbyes to Deneb tonight at 7:00 o’clock when it is seven fists above the western horizon.

Thursday: Jupiter is four fists above the eastern horizon at 10:00 p.m. Mars is less than one fist above the east-northeastern horizon

Friday: Vega is three and a half fists above the western horizon at 8:00 p.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. All times are Pacific Time unless noted.