Take a Break: Stargaze

While I’m a little late in celebrating Astronomy week (May 2-8) and the day itself May 7, there are lots of wonderful things to observe in the night sky. Whether you live in the country or city, try to get outside this evening and enjoy. Want to know what to look for? The following links will help you identify what’s in the sky where you live:

• Star Date: From the University of Texas McDonald Observatory

• Your Sky: An on-line interactive planetarium where you can make your own sky map

• Stellarium: Free planetarium for your computer. It shows a realistic sky in 3 D, just like what you see with the naked eye, binoculars or a telescope. Set your coordinates and enjoy.

While it’s not the same as lying back in one of those special chairs at the local planetarium, you can observe the sky digitally, pause to find out more about a constellation and pretend your are any where in the world stargazing via Neave Planetarium.

Find a Club, Museum, Observatory, Planetarium near you
• Astronomy Clubs

• Night Sky Network from NASA

• Sky and Telescope

Want to do more than observe stars for a night? NASA’s Citizen Scientists has established programs where people can volunteer to help the astronomy community. Such programs include: Be a Martian, improving Martian maps; HiWish, deciding where the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter will point its camera; Lunar Impacts, monitor the rates and sizes of large meteoroids striking the moon’s dark side. You can also sign up for NASA’s e-mail updates on a variety of topics.

Even though we may have missed Astronomy Day, May 11 is actually very special. The following is from NASA Science News:

Look out any east-facing window about a half hour before sunrise. If you have a clear view of the horizon, you'll see Mercury, Venus, Mars and Jupiter clustered together in a patch of sky less than 10o wide. If you wanted to, you could hide them all behind your outstretched hand—but don't. The view is too good.

The best morning is May 11th, when Venus and Jupiter converge to form a tight pair only 1/2o apart. (Now you can hide them using no more than one finger.) Venus and Jupiter are so bright you might think you've witnessed a double supernova beaming through the morning twilight. But, no, it's just the two brightest planets in our own solar system.

A ScienceCast video about this event contains an animated sky map.
Keep an eye on Venus in particular. As the sun rises and the sky fills with morning blue, the Goddess of Love does not fade away. You can actually see Venus in broad daylight if you know where to look.

May 11th is just the beginning. Throughout the month, the quartet of worlds will rearrange themselves on a daily basis, forming different shapes in the pre-dawn sky.

On May 13th, for instance, Mercury, Venus and Jupiter form a bright celestial triangle--almost equilateral. It's a geometry lesson before breakfast. On May 20th, a new triangle will appear. This time the vertices are Mars, Venus, and Mercury. Observing tip: Mars is not as bright as the others. Binoculars may be required to help you find and fully appreciate the red planet in morning twilight.

The show comes to an end on May 30th when an exquisite crescent Moon joins the four planets for a Grand Finale--five heavenly lights dotting the eastern sky all at once.