I just remembered that Mars is supposed to be the 2nd brightest object in the night sky. Aug 27 was it's closest. Supposedly a modest power telescope will make Mar appear as large as looking at the moon with a naked eye.
Mars is close than it's been for 5,000 years.
- Thread starter old pooner
- Start date
It will reach a magnitude of -2.9 at 25.11 arc seconds wide. It will reach it's highest point at about 12:30AM.
Well, I went onto my balcony at 10:30 (my balcony faces south) and I can't see anything particularly bight.
every night for about half to one hour after sunset, only the planets can be seen. That's the best time to locate them. Depending on your eyesight you can barely see colours to them which will help identify mars, venus etc. on a good clear night saturn actually looks slightly elliptical from the rings. jupiter is usually the biggest and the brightest, but now it is mars. eventually the stars start to appear with sirius the first, then it gets pretty hard to pick out the planets
Night Skys
All sorts of bad info here folks, except for the part about the sky being beautiful and humbling.
Mars is only magnitude 1.5 to 1, substantially dimmer than -2.9, and is rising well after midnight. Nothing special here.
It is only Venus and Mercury that are limited to the morning and evening skys because only they have orbits smaller than that of earth. The other planets can be anywhere.
It is Jupiter that will peak at magnitude -2.9 on October 28th when it rises at sunset. That puts it in the eastern sky at sunset.
Any of the astronomy magazines or web sites will have a description of what is where at various times but spotting the Iridium sattelites and the space station is fun. The info you need is at http://heavens-above.com/
Cheers
All sorts of bad info here folks, except for the part about the sky being beautiful and humbling.
Mars is only magnitude 1.5 to 1, substantially dimmer than -2.9, and is rising well after midnight. Nothing special here.
It is only Venus and Mercury that are limited to the morning and evening skys because only they have orbits smaller than that of earth. The other planets can be anywhere.
It is Jupiter that will peak at magnitude -2.9 on October 28th when it rises at sunset. That puts it in the eastern sky at sunset.
Any of the astronomy magazines or web sites will have a description of what is where at various times but spotting the Iridium sattelites and the space station is fun. The info you need is at http://heavens-above.com/
Cheers
