This week, I’m in Tucson, AZ helping with the Vatican Observatory Foundation’s 2019 Faith and Astronomy Workshop (#FAWVOF). It’s startling to see how high the waxing gibbous Moon is, and how low Ursa Major is in the sky compared to where I see them in Michigan!
Ursa Major and Ursa Minor (the Big and Little Dippers) are low in the northern sky at midnight.
Ursa Major and Ursa Minor low in the northern sky at midnight. Credit: Stellarium / Bob Trembley.The conjunction of Jupiter, Venus and the star Antares continues in the southeastern predawn sky all week; I got to see this as I was walking across the facility to the kitchen to get a cup of coffee – Venus was brilliant! Saturn also makes its return to the early morning sky.
Predawn conjunction of Jupiter, Venus and Antares. Credit: Stellarium / Bob Trembley.A waxing gibbous Moon appears near the constellation Taurus high in the southern sky after sunset
Waxing gibbous Moon high in the southern sky after sunset. Credit: Stellarium / Bob Trembley.In Tucson, the star Deneb appears in the western sky after sunset where the stars Altair and Vega appear from Michigan.
Altair and Vega are much lower in the western sky at dusk than in Michigan. Credit: Stellarium / Bob Trembley.Mars appears higher in the southwestern sky after sunset than in Michigan.
Mars high in the southwestern sky after sunset – Jan. 15, 2019. Credit: Stellarium / Bob Trembley.
The Total Lunar Eclipse – Jan. 20th
Total Lunar Eclipse Oct. 26, 2004. Image credit: Bob TrembleyThe Moon will pass through the shadow of the Earth on the evening of Jan. 20th, and millions in North and South America will be able to see it, as well as residents in England and northern Europe.
Back in Michigan, the Warren Astronomical Society will be hosting a viewing party at their Stargate Observatory, and will also be helping out at the Cranbrook Institute of Science. Cranbrook has 3000+ RSVPs for their event, and you can bet other observatories and museums across the Americas will see similar turnouts.
The next total lunar eclipse will occur on May 26, 2021.
Total Lunar Eclipse – Jan. 20, 2019. Eclipse Predictions by Fred Espenak, NASA GSFC Emeritus
The Moon is a waxing gibbous – just past first quarter – it will be visible in the southeast in early evening, and up for most of the night. The Moon will be full on the 20th, with a bonus eclipse (see above). The full Moon rises at sunset, and appears high in the sky around midnight, and is visible all night.After the 20th, the Moon will be a waning gibbous, rising after sunset, appearing high in the sky after midnight, and visible to the southwest after sunrise.
The Moon from Jan. 15-21, 2019. Visualizations by Ernie Wright.
The Sun has been spotless for 8 days. The northern coronal hole seems to have shrunk a little, while the southern hole seems to have expanded a little. There is a large coronal hole near the equator rotating into view.
Several long-lasting prominences appeared all over the limb of the Sun the last few days – crack out your solar telescope, if you have one!
The solar wind speed is 356.9 km/sec (↓), with a density of 4.5 protons/cm3 (↓).
Animated LASCO C2 Coronograph showing the solar corona above the Sun’s limb (the white circle). Credit: NASA/JPL-CaltechYou can create your own time-lapse movies of the Sun here: AIA/HMI Browse Data.
You can browse all the SDO images of the Sun from 2010 to the present here: Browse SDO archive.
Upcoming Earth-asteroid encounters:
| Asteroid |
Date(UT)
|
Miss Distance
|
Velocity (km/s)
|
Diameter (m)
|
| 2019 AX5 |
2019-Jan-09
|
9.5 LD
|
10.3
|
23
|
| 2018 YQ2 |
2019-Jan-10
|
7.5 LD
|
5.7
|
21
|
| 2013 YM2 |
2019-Jan-10
|
7.8 LD
|
4.3
|
23
|
| 2019 AD |
2019-Jan-10
|
3 LD
|
5.6
|
11
|
| 2019 AW7 |
2019-Jan-10
|
11.6 LD
|
21.4
|
131
|
| 2018 YU2 |
2019-Jan-12
|
5.6 LD
|
4.6
|
19
|
| 2019 AE9 |
2019-Jan-12
|
0.3 LD
|
19.2
|
13
|
| 2019 AX2 |
2019-Jan-12
|
17.6 LD
|
22.1
|
43
|
| 2019 AK3 |
2019-Jan-12
|
4.9 LD
|
10.7
|
14
|
| 2019 AC9 |
2019-Jan-12
|
4.1 LD
|
10.1
|
26
|
| 2019 AR2 |
2019-Jan-13
|
7.6 LD
|
4.8
|
49
|
| 2019 AG3 |
2019-Jan-14
|
12.9 LD
|
14.6
|
85
|
| 2019 AS6 |
2019-Jan-14
|
12.1 LD
|
7.2
|
20
|
| 2019 AU6 |
2019-Jan-14
|
2.6 LD
|
8.9
|
17
|
| 2018 XN |
2019-Jan-14
|
11.9 LD
|
5.6
|
59
|
| 2019 AT6 |
2019-Jan-15
|
8.1 LD
|
5.1
|
10
|
| 2019 AM8 |
2019-Jan-15
|
8.6 LD
|
10.9
|
15
|
| 2019 AG7 |
2019-Jan-15
|
3.9 LD
|
6.8
|
30
|
| 2019 AU9 |
2019-Jan-16
|
7.7 LD
|
5.1
|
15
|
| 2019 AM10 |
2019-Jan-16
|
17.5 LD
|
3.6
|
36
|
| 2019 AR8 |
2019-Jan-16
|
9.7 LD
|
8.9
|
27
|
| 2019 AC3 |
2019-Jan-17
|
10.7 LD
|
4.4
|
12
|
| 2019 AB5 |
2019-Jan-19
|
7.5 LD
|
6.6
|
28
|
| 2019 AZ8 |
2019-Jan-20
|
13.7 LD
|
10
|
24
|
| 2019 AO8 |
2019-Jan-20
|
10.4 LD
|
11.3
|
26
|
| 2019 AX8 |
2019-Jan-22
|
18.1 LD
|
16.2
|
38
|
| 2019 AA10 |
2019-Jan-26
|
5.6 LD
|
9.8
|
28
|
| 2013 CW32 |
2019-Jan-29
|
13.9 LD
|
16.4
|
148
|
| 2019 AV2 |
2019-Feb-01
|
17.6 LD
|
13
|
204
|
| 2013 RV9 |
2019-Feb-06
|
17.9 LD
|
5.9
|
68
|
| 2017 PV25 |
2019-Feb-12
|
7.3 LD
|
6.1
|
43
|
| 455176 |
2019-Feb-20
|
19.2 LD
|
26.5
|
269
|
| 2016 CO246 |
2019-Feb-22
|
15.8 LD
|
5.5
|
23
|
| 2018 DE1 |
2019-Feb-27
|
19.8 LD
|
6.5
|
28
|
| 2016 FU12 |
2019-Feb-27
|
15.4 LD
|
5.2
|
15
|
| 2015 EG |
2019-Mar-04
|
1.2 LD
|
9.6
|
26
|
| 2013 EG68 |
2019-Mar-13
|
19.3 LD
|
17
|
37
|
| 2012 VZ19 |
2019-Mar-13
|
7.7 LD
|
8
|
27
|
Notes: LD means “Lunar Distance.” 1 LD = 384,401 km, the distance between Earth and the Moon. Table from SpaceWeather.com
Near-Earth objects (NEOs) discovered this month: 140, this year: 140, all time: 19531
Potentially hazardous asteroids: 1947 (last updated Dec. 26, 2018)
Minor Planets discovered: 789,069 (last updated Oct. 30, 2018)
Asteroid 6478 Gault sprouts a tail!
6478 Gault’s tail. Credit: Damian PeachLast week, astronomers working with the ATLAS project in Hawaii announced an astonishing change to asteroid 6478 Gault. The space rock had sprouted a tail. It is now gliding through the asteroid belt giving every appearance of being a comet. On Jan. 9th, Damian Peach of Selsey UK photographed the 6478 Gault and its 400,000 kilometer-long tail.
“This is a 60 minute sequence of images, which I captured using a 20-inch telescope,” says Peach.
What happened to 6478 Gault? A clue may be found in its lineage. Asteroid Gault is a member of the Phocaea family, a swarm of rocks in the inner asteroid belt that formed as a result of inter-asteroid collisions some 2.2 billion years ago. The family gets its name from its most massive survivor, 25 Phocaea, which is about 75 km in diameter.
Gault’s tail may be a result of a collision. Researchers with the ATLAS project have looked at images of Gault in Dec. 2018 and Jan. 2019. Extrapolating its appearance backwards in time, they suggest that Gault hit another object in the asteroid belt in Nov. 2018. If that idea is correct, the tail would be debris from the crash. Astronomers around the world are now monitoring 6478 Gault to see what happens next. – SpaceWeather.com
On Jan. 14, 2019, the NASA All Sky Fireball Network reported 3 fireballs.
(3 sporadics)
In this diagram of the inner solar system, all of the fireball orbits from Jan 14, 2019 intersect at a single point–Earth. Source: Spaceweather.comThe NASA All-sky Fireball Network is a network of cameras set up by the NASA Meteoroid Environment Office (MEO) with the goal of observing meteors brighter than the planet Venus, which are called fireballs. If you would be interested in helping by setting up an All-Sky Fireball Network camera at your site, contact Dr. Bill Cooke.
https://twitter.com/MoniBalz/status/1083478099998769152
OH LOOK! A comet other than 46P/Wirtanen!
I looked up comet C/2018 Y1 on the JPL Small Body Database Browser – it’s aphelion is WAY out in the Kuiper belt!
Comet C-2018 Y1 (Iwamoto). Credit: JPL Small Body Database Browser.
Comet C-2018 Y1 (Iwamoto) close-up Credit: JPL Small Body Database Browser.
This is the position of the planets and a couple spacecraft in the solar system.
Position of the planets in the inner solar system, Jan. 15, 2019. Credit: NASA Eyes on the Solar System / Bob Trembley.The Parker Solar Probe will reach perihelion on Saturday Jan. 19th.
Parker Solar Probe Perihelion 1 – Jan. 19, 2019. Credit: NASA Eyes on the Solar System / Bob Trembley.MarCO A and B continue to increase their distance from Mars after the InSight landing in November.
Mars pulling ahead of MarCO A and B. Credit: NASA Eyes on the Solar System / Bob Trembley.
Position of the planets in the middle solar system, Jan. 15, 2019. Credit: NASA Eyes on the Solar System / Bob Trembley.
Position of the planets in the outer solar system, Jan. 15, 2019. Credit: NASA Eyes on the Solar System / Bob Trembley.
Hubble Space Telescope – In Trouble Again!
OSIRIS-REx – in a CLOSE Orbit of Asteroid Bennu
The other day, I had lunch with Br. Guy and several people from the Planetary Science Institute – including a member of the OSIRIS-REx mission team. I could have listened to her for HOURS! She said that new HI-REZ images of asteroid Bennu will be released by the end of the month – I can’t wait!
Sentinel2 satellite – The Earth as Art
-Data from the NASA Exoplanet Archive
In the category of “Weird events from halfway across the Universe,” Canadian astronomers detect a “Repeating Fast Radio Burst.”
Apps used for this post:
NASA Eyes on the Solar System: an immersive 3D solar system and space mission simulator – free for the PC /MAC.
I maintain the unofficial NASA Eyes Facebook page.
Stellarium: a free open source planetarium app for PC/MAC/Linux. It’s a great tool for planning observing sessions.
Section header image credits:
The Sky – Stellarium/ Bob Trembley
Observing Target – Turn Left at Orion / M. Skirvin
The Moon – NASA/JPL-Caltech
The Sun – NASA/JPL-Caltech
Asteroids – NASA/JPL-Caltech
Fireballs – Credited to YouTube
Comets –Comet P/Halley, March 8, 1986, W. Liller
The Solar System – NASA Eyes on the Solar System / Bob Trembley
Spacecraft News – NASA Eyes on the Solar System / Bob Trembley
Exoplanets – Space Engine / Bob Trembley
July 20, 2019 is the 50th Anniversary of the Apollo 11 landing on the Moon.