It’s Not Planet X, That’s for Sure

Astronomers and planetarium folk have been getting the usual phone calls about “something bright in the West” after sunset.  It’s true. There is something bright out there… but it’s disappearing fast.  It’s the planet Venus, and it’s sinking lower into the western sky each day, and brightens up the post-sunset sky like a jewel hanging there against the dusk.

I love going out to look at Venus. It’s really quite beautiful, and it’s easy to understand why some early observers would call it a goddess. It just gleams in the sky.

Venus looks bright because it’s a cloud-covered world, and those clouds reflect sunlight. Also, it’s a bit closer to us in its orbit right now, and thus appears bigger and brighter.

Venus has a long history in science fiction of being a swamp world or a desert world.  I remember reading some early science fiction where people from Earth were eking out a living among dinosaur-type creatures.  Another book in my library, written in the late 50s, had Earthlings settling on a dry and dusty cloud-covered Venus, and ultimately launching attacks on Earth.

Those stories were WAY off the mark however. In the 1960s, we sent our first probes to Venus, and right away discovered the truth: a world with a poisonous atmosphere that is so heavy it destroyed the probes that landed on the planet. Later on, orbiters such as the Magellan mission mapped the volcanoes of Venus, showing us once and for all that our “sister planet” is not a very hospitable place.

But, or course, you don’t see that when you gaze at the orb of Venus hanging low in the western sky these May nights. That doesn’t make it less lovely to ponder as the sky darkens.   Before too long, Venus will be a morning object, right after it transits the Sun on June 5/6.  So, go check it out. Here’s a map to get you started!

Look for Venus low in the west after sunset for the next few weeks before it disappears in the glare of the Sun.

They’re Up There: You Can’t Miss Them

The May night skies, with Saturn and Mars.

The planets Mars and Saturn are gleaming up there in the sky these May nights.  Saturn is in the constellation Virgo, not far from the bright star Spica. I’ve seen a lot of images people are posting of Saturn, and the rings are standing out. So, if you have a decent pair of binoculars, or even better, a small telescope, you can spot those rings yourself.

When I was a kid, one of the first images of a planet I saw was of Saturn. Those rings absolutely mystified me. They were the most alien thing I could think of “out there” and I often wondered how such things could form. Astronomers knew the rings were made up of particles, but it wasn’t until the Voyager mission to Saturn that they knew just how complex the system really is. And, of course, the Cassini Mission is taking their understanding to new heights.  You can find some gorgeous views of Saturn from Cassini at the mission Web site, and I think they’ll whet your appetite to see the planet for yourself.

Mars is close to the bright star Regulus, in the constellation of Leo the Lion. It’s a reddish-looking blob of light and if you have a fairly powerful backyard telescope, you can make out some of the surface markings (dark and light) on the planet.  Of course, the best way to look at Mars (after you’ve spotted it in your night sky) is to surf over to NASA’s Mars site, or ESA’s Mars Express page.  There, you’ll find many fascinating images of the Red Planet taken by spacecraft visiting the planet “up close and personal”.

Go out these May nights and check out the planets. They’re not hard to find and they’ll pique your curiosity. I guarantee it!

Test Your Eyes with Alcor and Mizar

The Big Dipper as seen from Kalalau Valley, Hawai'i. Courtesy User: gh5046; used under a Creative Commons ShareAlike License. on Wikipedia.

The Big Dipper is one of those constellations we all learn (in the Northern Hemisphere) pretty early on. It’s easy to spot, it’s a shape that most of us recognize — even if some of us in Europe and other regions call it a Plough. It’s a pattern that we use to teach people how to find other things in the sky, such as the star Arcturus or the North Star (Polaris).

Of course, the Big Dipper is part of a larger constellation called “Ursa Major” which is Latin for “Greater Bear”.  The Dipper forms the back and tail of the Bear, and there are tales across many of the world’s cultures about this Bear and its exploits.  Most of us don’t look for all the stars of the bear, preferring to concentrate on the Dipper itself.

If you look at the Big Dipper’s handle, there’s a double star you can spot with your  naked eye (provided you have a good dark viewing area).  If you live in a city, you can probably spot the double with binoculars or a small telescope.

Those two stars are called Alcor and Mizar and for many years, people would use the ability to spot these two without magnification as a test of their eyesight.  They lie about a light-year apart and they are moving together through space as part of a larger group of stars called the Ursa Major Moving Group.

As it turns out, when you look at Alcor and Mizar, you’re looking at a six-star system. Alcor itself is actually two stars called Alcor A and B, and Mizar is really a system of two binary stars (making four total stars for Mizar).   It’s worth checking out and the weather this time of year is great for kicking back and seeing if YOU can make out Alcor and Mizar with your naked eye. (You won’t find the other stars without some major magnification, but that’s okay.  The objective here is to see what you can find just by taking a gander at the bend in the Dipper’s handle. Check it out!

Lunar Feeding Frenzy

So, this weekend we’re supposed to be seeing something called the “SuperMoon”.  I don’t know what that means, really.  It’s another superlative name like “OctoMom” or “MegaMillions” that really doesn’t tell you much.  Oh, sure, MegaMillions is a come-0n to buy lottery tickets, but honestly, the last time I bought one, the prize wasn’t so “Mega”.  It was more like a few million.  Now “mega” would be a prize to win.  If you don’t believe me, go look it up. And don’t get me started on all the wrongness of the name “OctoMom”.  You can look that one up on your own time.

Getting back to “SuperMoon”.  The Full Moon occurs on Sunday May 6 at 03:35 UT (that’s Saturday May 5 at 8:35 p.m., PDT, 9:35 p.m. Mountain Time, 10:35 p.m., CDT, 11:35 p.m. EDT, in the U.S.).  It just so happens that it’s occurring at the same time that the Moon is closest to Earth in its orbit.  This is perfectly normal. It happens in the orbital mechanics of the Earth-Moon-Sun system. The Moon’s distance varies during its orbit; sometimes it’s closer and sometimes it’s farther away.

The Full Moon will be at perigee, essentially. Or, if you want the technical term: the event is referred to by scientists as perigee-syzygy (of the Earth-Sun-Moon system).   The Moon will be 12 percent brighter and larger than the usual Full Moon.  Will you be able to tell the difference between the Moon at perigee at Full Moon and a Full Moon NOT at perigee?  Probably not.  It’s not going to appear much different to you unless you make a practice of charting the Moon’s size and brightness daily (or nightly). Mind you, it’s still going to be beautiful.  I like what my friend Neil deGrasse Tyson said about it:  ”The impending Supermoon is to an average full Moon what a 16″ Pizza is to a 15″ Pizza. So chillax.”

Interestingly enough, the term “supermoon” isn’t really even a scientific one. It appears to be an astrological one, and at least one writer (and probably more) have come up with the idea that these supermoons cause earthquakes and other natural disasters. However, the evidence (taken from actual observations of when earthquakes and other events actually happened) doesn’t support the idea. That hasn’t stopped people who really ought to know better from hyping the “SuperMoon” as some sort of mystical time when Earth is in danger. Orbital mechanics being what they are, supermoons are gonna happen, and earthquakes are gonna happen, but the likelihood of one influencing the other is pretty darned low.

If I were you, I’d just go out and enjoy the beauty of the Full Moon. It doesn’t have to be “Super” for you and yours to step out with a pair of binoculars or a small telescope and just explore the lunar surface. It can be quite relaxing… and breathtaking. No hype needed.