The Ellensburg WA sky for the week of 5/25/19

Saturday:  In 1979, the group Foreigner recorded the song “Head Games”. They could have been singing about the constellations Hercules and Ophiuchus when they said “head games, it’s just you and me baby, head games, I can’t take it anymore” because the heads of these two constellations have been right next to each other in the nighttime sky for all of human history. And just to make it easy for you, a star that bears an Arabic name that means “the head” represents each head. In Hercules, it's Ras Algethi (head of the kneeler); in Ophiuchus, Ras Alhague (head of the serpent charmer). At 11 p.m., Ras Alhague, the brighter of the two, is three and a half fists held upright and at arm’s length above the east-southeast horizon. Ras Algethi is about a half a fist to the upper right of Ras Alhague.

Sunday: In 1982, the British group Bow Wow Wow first sang, “I Want Candy”. In May 2019, NASA finally granted that wish by releasing images of Mars’ moon Phobos looking like candy.  The thermal imaging camera on NASA’s long lived Odyssey orbiter took a series of images of the full phase of Phobos. The resulting composite, looking like a many layered jaw-breaker, shows how the temperature varies throughout the small moon. This temperature distribution, in turn, can help astronomers determine what the moon is made of. For more about this yummy treat, go to https://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.php?feature=7398. Mars is one and a half fists above the west-northwest horizon at 9:30 p.m.

Monday: The questions who, what, where, and when can only be asked with a “W”. At 10:30 p.m., the W-shaped constellation Cassiopeia is about one and a half fists above due north. The middle star in the W was used as a navigation reference point during the early space missions. The American astronaut Gus Grissom nicknamed the star Navi, his middle name Ivan spelled backwards. After he died in the Apollo 1 fire, the star name was kept as a memorial.

Tuesday: Ceres is in opposition tonight. That doesn’t mean it refuses to eat its vegetables. It means that Ceres is on the opposite side of the Earth as the Sun is so it is highest in the sky during the darkest part of the night. Also, it is visible with binoculars for the entire night. Go outside at 11 p.m. and find Jupiter one fist above the southeast horizon. The bright reddish star Antares is about a fist to the right of Jupiter. Put Antares at the bottom of your field of view. There will be a star right above Antares, one in the center of your field of view, and one near the upper left portion of your field of view that are about the same brightness as each other. Move that third star to the bottom of your field of view. There will be a star to the upper right and a star near the center of the field of view that are about the same brightness as the bottom star. Ceres is to the upper right of the star at center of the field of view. Try to find this object for the next few nights. You’ll know you have the right object if it moves a little bit to the right each night.

Wednesday: Altair, the lowest star in the Summer Triangle, is one fist above due east at 11 p.m.

Thursday: The Moon is about a half a fist above the east horizon at 4:30 a.m. But what if you just want to sleep in? Easy, check out the Moon online. One of the best live Moon maps is found at https://quickmap.lroc.asu.edu/. See the most up to date lunar images at fantastic resolution, down to about two meters. You could easily tell the difference between a car and a minivan on the moon.

Friday: The CWU Physics Department is hosting its monthly First Saturday planetarium show tomorrow from noon to 1 p.m. The CWU Astronomy Club will give a series of short shows about southern constellations, Mars, and the Moon. The show is free and open to all ages. There will be a show on the first Saturday of every month of the school year hosted by different CWU astronomers and astronomy educators. The CWU Lydig Planetarium is room 101 in Science Phase II, just off the corner of 11th and Wildcat Way, H-11 on the campus map found at https://www.cwu.edu/facility/campus-map.

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.