seen from Germany
seen from China
seen from United States
seen from United States
seen from China
seen from United States
seen from Malaysia
seen from Bulgaria
seen from Malaysia
seen from Canada
seen from China
seen from United Kingdom
seen from United States
seen from United Kingdom
seen from China
seen from Paraguay
seen from China
seen from Türkiye
seen from Türkiye
seen from Finland
Venus in August 2018
Venus in August 2018
Everyone else may be talking about Mars, but don’t miss your chance to check out Venus this month!
The maximum elongations for Venus are shown with the dashed lines, and those for Mercury are shown with the dotted lines.
Venus orbits closer to the Sun than we do. That means from our point of view, it never gets very far from the Sun. When it is farthest in the sky from the Sun, we call it…
View On WordPress
Elusive Mercury in the Evening
This weekend promises amazing weather for December in SE Michigan. Take advantage of it by looking for the elusive planet Mercury!
Sunset on December 1 in A2 is at about 5:03 PM, and Mercury sets at about 6, so grab a pair of binoculars and go out between roughly 5:15 – 5:45 and look low in the SW. Be sure to check out Saturn too: it’ll disappear behind the Sun soon! The image below is for 5:30…
View On WordPress
Venus and the Beehive
Venus and the Beehive
If you happen to be up around 6 AM local time the next few mornings (August 31 – September 2, 2017) grab a pair of binoculars. Venus skims past one of my favorite open clusters in the pre-dawn hours.
Look east, between the Big Dipper and Orion, just below Gemini. You won’t be able to miss Venus. It’ll even shine through light cloud cover! If it’s clear, point your binoculars that way and you’ll…
View On WordPress
Venus brightest around February 16 | EarthSky.org
Venus brightest around February 16 | EarthSky.org
If it’s clear where you are this evening (or the next several evenings really), look high in the west about half an hour after sunset. That incredibly bright point of light you see is not a star, it’s Venus! If you happen to have a small telescope or good pair of binoculars, take a look at it. You’ll see it’s actually a crescent!
As long as you’ve got your telescope/binoculars out, be sure to…
View On WordPress
Transit of Mercury May 9 2016
Transit of Mercury May 9 2016
Phil Plait posted a very nice guide to the transit. It includes a long list of available webcasts, in case it’s cloudy or night where you are.
The highlights:
You’ll need magnification. DO NOT LOOK AT THE SUN WITHOUT APPROPRIATE FILTERS.
The transit runs 11:12 – 18:39 UT, or about 7:12 AM to 2:39 PM Ann Arbor time.
If you’re in SE Michigan, here’s a list of places you can go to observe the transit
View On WordPress
April 4 lunar eclipse
April 4 lunar eclipse
Here in the midwest, we’ll have a partial lunar eclipse at dawn on April 4. Further west observers get to see the whole eclipse of course, and if you go far enough west, it’ll be saturday night when the eclipse happens. check out Timeanddate.com for timing and how much will be visible from your area.
If you want some details on what features to look for, check out Fred Espenak’s eclipsewise site.…
View On WordPress
Viewing Comet Lovejoy
Comet Lovejoy, C/2014 Q2 is about 4th magnitude right now. if your observing sight is dark, it’s easily naked eye. Urban observers aren’t so lucky, but it’s bright enough to be picked by a camera!
You’ll need a camera you can set the exposure and focus on (some smart phone apps will do that.) I strongly recommend a tripod since you’ll need an exposure of a few seconds.
Focus first on Jupiter:…
View On WordPress
December 2014 Urban Observing post 1
December 2014 Urban Observing post 1
November kind of got away from me, again. So here’s a short post to tide you over until the real one in a couple of days.
On December 1, the Moon is less than 1º from Uranus. Jupiter rises around 11 PM.
The Moon and Uranus in Pisces on December 1 at 7 PM
It becomes reasonable to look for Saturn in the pre-dawn sky during the first week of December. Even better, “pre-dawn” is around 7 AM. Mercury…
View On WordPress
