Saturday: Venus is one fist held upright and at arm’s length above the west-northwestern horizon at 9:00 p.m., just to the left of a two-day-old moon.
Sunday: The small house-shaped head of Hydra is four fists
above the southwestern horizon at 10:00 p.m.
Monday: Sirius, the brightest star in the night sky, is
getting lower and lower as the days go by. It is
one fist above the southwestern horizon at 9:00 p.m. By mid-May, it will be lost in the glare of the setting Sun.
Tuesday: The Lyrid meteor shower peaks tonight. The meteors
appear to come from a point to the right of the bright bluish star Vega in the
constellation Lyra the lyre. This point is about three fists above the
east-northeast horizon at midnight tonight. The best time to observe this year is between midnight and dawn.
Typically, this is one of the least interesting major meteor showers of the
year, with 10-20 bright, fast meteors per hour. However, it is also one of the
most unpredictable. As recently as in 1982, there were 90 meteors visible
during a single hour. In addition, the Lyrid meteor shower has historical
interest because it was one of the first ones observed.
Chinese records say “stars fell like rain” in the shower of 687 B.C. As your mother
might say, dress warmly and sit in a comfortable chair for maximum enjoyment.
Meteors are tiny rocks that hit the Earth and burn up in the atmosphere. For
more information, go to http://earthsky.org/?p=158735.
Wednesday: Jupiter is less than a half a fist below the moon
at 9:00 p.m., about five fists above the west-southwestern horizon.
Thursday: Even
though Zubenelgenubi is the second brightest star in Libra, its name means
Southern Claw in Arabic, an artifact of the time that it was
considered part of Scorpius the scorpion. Zubenelgenubi is a visual binary,
consisting of a white and yellow star that are about 230 arc minutes apart from
each other in the sky. This is about the same angular distance as the diameter
of a medium sized dark spot on the Moon and can be
easily resolved with binoculars. In actuality, the two stars are at least
5,500 astronomical units apart from each other, about 130 times the distance
between the Sun and Pluto. Libra is one and a half fists above the southeastern
horizon at midnight.
Friday: 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 counterclockwise 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.
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.
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