This month is an fascinating one for these of us who like to stargaze. I do know the nights are nonetheless cooler, so wrap up and head out to observe the celebrities. Whereas the solar will steadily set later and later till the summer time solstice. We’ll nonetheless have loads of darkish sky time. Whereas we do, discover someplace with as little gentle as doable to look out to the universe.
Constellations
We’re going to see some recognisable constellations for this month together with Orion the Hunter (finest recognized for his belt of three stars) and Taurus with some notable deep sky objects of its personal. Each constellations are fairly outdated, recorded by an astronomer known as Ptolemy within the 2nd century, however he didn’t create or think about them. They have been two of forty eight constellations that he discovered of whereas learning the celebrities. Again then there have been no telescopes for astronomers to make use of, so every part they noticed was with the bare eye. Within the time since then, the celebrities have shifted, however the shapes of the constellations would be the identical to our eyes. So, we are able to look to Orion first.
Beneath the asterism of Orion’s Belt, we are able to see a vibrant smudge which is definitely a nebula. Conveniently, it’s named the Orion Nebula. This nebula is about 1300 lightyears away and 25 lightyears throughout.
Planets
Again in January there was numerous commotion a couple of planet parade, and I feel that’s justified. For the primary few weeks of February, we could have SIX planets within the evening sky, starting from Saturn within the West to Mars within the East. So don’t fear if you happen to missed it when it had all of the hype in January. Venus will change into seen because the solar units within the night and because the sky turns into darker extra planets and stars will seem. Now it is very important be aware that of the six planets within the sky, solely 4 are seen to the bare eye. Saturn, Venus, Jupiter and Mars (from West to East) might be seen unaided. Nevertheless, when you’ve got a telescope, you would possibly have the ability to discover Uranus and Neptune within the southern sky.
All of our planets fall on or near the Ecliptic, which might is 2 issues (1) The trail of the Solar throughout the background of the celebrities; and (2) The aircraft of the photo voltaic system. In a way, the orbits of the planets are fairly ‘stage’ with one another, though not excellent.
Chasing the Moon
From the 1st to the 9th of February we will likely be chasing the Moon throughout the night sky for Nationwide Astronomy week. On every evening the Moon will shift and transfer via its phases to be practically full on the final evening. You probably have a telescope or binoculars, will probably be a lot clearer, and you’ll see some craters and the maria (darkish patches) on the moon. When it reaches the primary quarter part on the 5th we are able to see the terminator line separating evening and day on the moon. On this line you would possibly see the shadows in among the craters as nicely.
The total moon will likely be on the 12th of February and is called the Snow Moon, as it’s nonetheless fairly chilly in elements of the Northern Hemisphere. This part of the moon does make it tougher to stargaze because it displays a lot gentle all the way down to Earth that most of the fainter stars are a lot much less seen than common.
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