If you have any clear nights toward the end of this month (they have been pretty rare for me lately) it'll be an ideal time to watch some prominent members of our solar system on the move. By the end of the month a climax will be reached as Venus and Jupiter approach a spectacularly pretty conjunction.
Right now if you look toward the south and west shortly after sunset, you should have no trouble identifying the planets even in the most light polluted skies. Jupiter will be a bright white spot to the south. It is easy to see even before the sky is totally dark. The only thing it could be mistaken for is a plane, but a plane would soon move out of the area, whereas Jupiter will not perceptibly move over a period of minutes. Jupiter can't compare to the blaze of Venus, though. Venus will be a bit further west, a bit closer to the horizon, and much brighter. Many people who see it and don't realize what it is think it's a UFO.
Watch the two planets over the course of days. You'll see that they get closer together. To me it seems like Jupiter is the one doing the moving, because Venus stays in about the same place from day to day with respect to the sunset. However, it's all a consequence of the relative movement of the planets, our own included. Much of Jupiter's apparent "movement" is due to the Earth itself, passing on the other side of the sun from Jupiter. In the meantime, Venus is on an "inner track" of our solar system, and is catching up to us.
On the last evening of November, the two planets will be as close to each other in our sky as they will get on this encounter. It should be a spectacular sight! On the next day, a thin crescent moon joins the group for an even more beautiful alignment. Over the next days, the moon will get fatter and head toward the east, while Jupiter continues to sink into the sunset.
The conjunction itself should be a wonderful sight, but it's well worth watching the entire setup from now until then, as the planets approach each other each evening. As you watch them, consider that they are not just dots in the sky, but entire worlds, moving across vast distances of our solar system.
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Comments: 18
Debbie, I should have thought of the Leonids. I deliberately went out to look for them one of those years they were particularly good but admittedly haven't looked for them much since. I get kind of lazy about my observing when the weather gets cold!
I'm hoping I'll see them while I'm in Michigan, but the forecast for Friday is snow.
Thank you for solving this unique happening for us, Dave.
After this, I still went outside to see them because I wanted to cool off--I was hot because showing the planets to other residents kept me inside longer than normal.
As for myself, this is the third night in a row I've been shut out by cloudy skies.
But only recently, since I got a camera that would take decent pictures and I figured out how to use it (somewhat) ... on looking back at my first tries and comparing them to some of my more recent photos (not professional by a long shot but definitely an improvement from when I first started); I realized that all the photos were good... even the bad ones, cause really, if you think of it ... even the blurry ones or the ones that had little detail were photos of things that were at minimum over 200,000 miles away (that's 200 thousand miles) away. Any picture taken from that distance has to be considered if not a prize, then at least something to marvel at.
Thanks for the articles.
As you watch them, consider that they are not just dots in the sky, but entire worlds, moving across vast distances of our solar system.
Dave Sandborg
Here are two more that might give some shivers to someone. Maybe you've run across them yourself a time or two. :)
http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap060927.html
http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap061016.html