Saturday: The CWU campus is mostly closed. But astronomy learning lives on! The Physics Department is hosting a First Saturday VIRTUAL planetarium show today from noon to 1:00 p.m. CWU Teach STEM students Grace Warren and Isabella Sullivan present the planetarium show Stars: past, present, and future! In addition, Professor Bruce Palmquist will highlight other stellar features from the November sky. The show is free and open to all ages. There will be a show at noon on the first Saturday of every month hosted by different CWU astronomers and astronomy educators. Stay at home, practice good physical distancing, and visit http://www.cwu.edu/campus-notices/lydig-virtual-planetarium-show-life-stars to register for the show and to attend online using Zoom.
Sunday: The bright planets Venus and Mercury and bright star Spica make a small triangle in the east-southeastern morning sky all week. Both Venus, which is at the top of the triangle, and Mercury, which is at the bottom, will be moving closer to the horizon as the days go by. Look for the triangle just above the east-southeastern horizon at 6:00 a.m.
Monday: At 6:00 p.m., the brightest point of light in the evening sky, Jupiter, is one and a half fists above the south-southwest horizon. Saturn is a half a fist to the upper left of Jupiter. Mars, which is about the same brightness as Jupiter, is two and a half fists above the east-southeast horizon at this time.
Tuesday: 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 10-12. For more information, visit http://goo.gl/0hwFQf or visit MIT. In addition, challenge yourself to find a similar alignment in your neighborhood.
Wednesday: The Northern Taurid meteor shower peaks tonight, November 11/12. These are slow moving meteors that result in the occasional fireball. The Taurid meteor showers produce a few bright meteors every hour. The Moon is in the waning crescent phase so it doesn’t rise until well after will obscure a lot of the meteors. These meteors appear to come from a point in Taurus the bull, near the open star cluster called the Pleiades. This point is about three fists held upright and at arm’s length above the east horizon at 8 p.m. You can follow this point throughout the night, as it will remain one fist above 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. These rocks are broken off parts of Comet 2P/Encke. For more information, go to https://earthsky.org/?p=136475.
Thursday: Did you open your Martinmas gifts yesterday? 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.
Friday: The Moon joins the Venus-Spica-Mercury to make an astronomical quadrilateral in the morning sky. Look for the foursome about one fist above the east-southeast horizon at 6:00 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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