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In the Sky This Week – January 29, 2019

By Robert Trembley  |  29 Jan 2019

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This entry is part 140 of 246 in the series In the Sky This Week

east-southeastern sky

When I was in Tucson recently, I marveled at the lack of orange sky glow over the city – the night sky was beautiful, and you could see many more stars from within the Tucson city limits, than I can see living 24 miles north of Detroit. See my previous post about Light Pollution.
[show_if device=’desktop’]The Sky | Observing Target | The Moon | The Sun | Asteroids | Fireballs | Comets | Solar System | Spacecraft | Exoplanets | The Universe

Venus continues to move away from Jupiter in the southeastern predawn sky; a waning crescent Moon joins Venus and Jupiter on the mornings of Jan. 29-31.

Paul Gabor, S.J.
Christopher J. Corbally, S.J.

Several familiar constellations and bright stars appear in the east-southeastern sky after sunset.

east-southeastern sky Bright stars and constellations in the east-southeastern sky after sunset on Jan. 29, 2019. Credit: Stellarium / Bob Trembley.

Mars appears high in the southwestern sky after sunset all week. Mars is a little getting higher, and drifting a little westward with each day.

Southwestern sky Mars is high in the southwestern sky after sunset all week. Credit: Stellarium / Bob Trembley.

I haven’t touched on the sky seen from the southern hemisphere in a while, so here’s the southeastern sky at 11:00 PM as seen from Río Gallegos – far to the south in South America. Crux – the “Southern Cross” is visible, as is Rigel Kentaurus, another name for Alpha Centauri.

Southeastern sky Rio Gallegos In the southern sky: the position of the globular cluster Omega Centauri is highlighted in the southeastern sky as seen from Río Gallegos at 11:00 PM on Jan. 29, 2019. Credit: Stellarium / Bob Trembley.

NGC 5139 – The Omega Centauri Globular Cluster

Br. Guy wanted to show me Omega Centauri while I was in Tucson, but sadly,  it was very low on horizon during the Vatican Observatory Foundation’s 2019 Faith and Astronomy Workshop, and the weather forecast called for clouds most of the week; I’ll have to make sure to suggest having at least one predawn observing session. I’ve heard endless stories about how beautiful Omega Centauri is, so I thought I share it this week.

Omega Centauri (ω Cen or NGC 5139) is a globular cluster in the constellation of Centaurus that was first identified as a non-stellar object by Edmond Halley in 1677. Located at a distance of 15,800 light-years (4,850 pc), it is the largest globular cluster in the Milky Way at a diameter of roughly 150 light-years. It is estimated to contain approximately 10 million stars and a total mass equivalent to 4 million solar masses.

Omega Centauri is so distinctive from the other galactic globular clusters that it is thought to have an alternate origin as the core remnant of a disrupted dwarf galaxy. – Wikipedia

Omega Centauri The globular cluster Omega Centauri — with as many as ten million stars — is seen in all its splendor in this image captured with the WFI camera from ESO’s La Silla Observatory. The image shows only the central part of the cluster — about the size of the full moon on the sky (half a degree). North is up, East is to the left. This color image is a composite of B, V and I filtered images. Note that because WFI is equipped with a mosaic detector, there are two small gaps in the image which were filled with lower quality data from the Digitized Sky Survey. Can you find them? NGC 5139 is another designation of this cluster. Credit: ESO

This video is an animation of a globular cluster slowly rotating in 3D. (I wish I could see this in Virtual Reality!)

This video shows a zoom-in to Omega Centauri – I can’t help but think of  Dr David Bowman’s exclamation from 2001 (book) or 2010 (film): “My God—it’s full of stars!”

You might ask “What does a star cluster look like over millions of years?”

And finally, a super-close-up of interior of Omega Centauri:

Omega Centauri Colorful Stars Galore Inside Globular Star Cluster Omega Centauri. NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope snapped this panoramic view of a colorful assortment of 100,000 stars residing in the crowded core of a giant star cluster. Credit: NASA, ESA, and the Hubble SM4 ERO Team

The Moon is an waning crescent – just past third quarter. It will be visible low to the east before sunrise. The new Moon will occur on Feb. 4th.

Moon The Moon from Jan. 22-28, 2019. Visualizations by Ernie Wright.

The northern coronal hole has opened up a bit since last week – the southern coronal hole is massive! Old sunspot AR 2733 is rotating out of view. SpaceWeather.com says: “A large hole in the sun’s atmosphere is facing Earth and spewing a stream of solar wind in our direction. Extreme ultraviolet telescopes onboard NASA’s Solar Dynamics Observatory photographed the structure on Jan. 28th”

https://sdo.gsfc.nasa.gov/assets/img/dailymov/2018/01/28/20180128_1024_0193.mp4

Another Just WOW moment! Last week’s beautiful HUGE prominence was in the lower right – this week, there’s another one in the upper right! This one has a looping bridge between two hedge-row prominences. A couple other prominences can be seen around the Sun’s limb.

https://sdo.gsfc.nasa.gov/assets/img/dailymov/2018/01/28/20180128_1024_0304.mp4

The solar wind speed is 360.2 km/sec (⇪), with a density of 5.7 protons/cm3 (⇪).

SOHO LASCO C2 Latest Image Animated LASCO C2 Coronograph showing the solar corona above the Sun’s limb (the white circle). Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
You can view the Sun in near real-time, in multiple frequencies here: SDO-The Sun Now.
You 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 AS11
2019-Jan-23
7 LD
4.3
16
2019 BU2
2019-Jan-23
9.3 LD
8.7
31
2019 AH13
2019-Jan-23
19 LD
2.4
22
2019 BZ
2019-Jan-23
2.5 LD
8.8
11
2019 BV1
2019-Jan-24
0.4 LD
14.4
7
2019 BO2
2019-Jan-24
6.7 LD
16.6
22
2019 AJ13
2019-Jan-25
7.6 LD
6
8
2019 AN12
2019-Jan-25
9.2 LD
20.3
29
2019 BK2
2019-Jan-25
2.9 LD
14.6
15
2019 BM2
2019-Jan-25
3 LD
11.4
21
2019 AG11
2019-Jan-25
8.6 LD
7.5
20
2019 AA10
2019-Jan-26
5.8 LD
10.3
26
2019 AQ14
2019-Jan-26
7.3 LD
9.3
14
2019 BF3
2019-Jan-26
16.2 LD
9.2
33
2019 BQ2
2019-Jan-27
3.3 LD
13.3
14
2019 BS2
2019-Jan-27
4.8 LD
10.1
13
2019 BR2
2019-Jan-28
1.7 LD
13.1
8
2019 AP11
2019-Jan-28
10.2 LD
7.8
32
2019 BV2
2019-Jan-28
9.1 LD
14.5
30
2019 BG3
2019-Jan-29
3.4 LD
28.2
22
2019 AN11
2019-Jan-29
12.7 LD
8.1
31
2013 CW32
2019-Jan-29
13.9 LD
16.4
148
2019 BJ1
2019-Jan-30
3.4 LD
16.7
40
2019 BC3
2019-Jan-31
12.2 LD
13.2
42
2019 BD3
2019-Feb-01
12.6 LD
8.4
27
2019 AV2
2019-Feb-01
17.5 LD
13
204
2019 BW1
2019-Feb-02
13 LD
9.6
40
2019 BH1
2019-Feb-03
11.2 LD
21.1
54
2019 BE3
2019-Feb-03
16.8 LD
18.5
48
2019 BH3
2019-Feb-04
14.1 LD
8.9
26
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
2019 BF1
2019-Feb-24
11.2 LD
9.1
108
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: 238, this year: 238, all time: 19630
Potentially hazardous asteroids: 1947 (last updated  Dec. 26, 2018)
Minor Planets discovered: 789,069 (last updated Oct. 30, 2018)

Annnnnnd I’ve just found another way to suck my time away: looking for 3D models of of asteroids on Sketchfab:

On Jan. 28, 2019, the NASA All Sky Fireball Network reported 13 fireballs.
(13 sporadics)

Fireball Orbits In this diagram of the inner solar system, all of the fireball orbits from Jan 28, 2019 intersect at a single point–Earth. Source: Spaceweather.com

#Fireball caught over Poland yesterday.

We received only one report about this event – https://t.co/WFZbXzTS3l

If you see something like that, please report it here: https://t.co/qRilnZsyyF

And if you don't know what it is…https://t.co/xg1AiMyhD0 pic.twitter.com/vDOkvOtlaK

— AMSMETEORS (@amsmeteors) January 24, 2019

Comet 38P. Currently in the constellation of the lynx. Image Rolando Ligustri pic.twitter.com/G5Quayz89s

— Con Stoitsis (@vivstoitsis) January 27, 2019

Comet 38P/Stephan-Oterma Comet 38P/Stephan-Oterma. Credit: JPL Small Body Database Browser / Bob Trembley

A bit of comet history:

Today is the anniversary of the birth, at Zábřeh on 29 Jan 1935, of the Czech #astronomer Luboš Kohoutek. He is best known for his discovery of Comet Kohoutek on 7 Mar 1973 and which became a reasonably prominent object following perihelion passage in December of that year. pic.twitter.com/PhnGhsTWkR

— Brian Jones (@StarsBrian) January 29, 2019

This is the position of the planets and a couple spacecraft in the solar system.

Paul Gabor, S.J.


Parker Solar Probe – Completes Orbit #1

#ParkerSolarProbe has finished its first complete orbit around the Sun! 🛰🔂☀️ On Jan. 19, the spacecraft reached aphelion, the point in its orbit where it's farthest from our star.

The team is now preparing for the next solar flyby in April 2019: https://t.co/IY11uDun2A pic.twitter.com/E1P9qck5u8

— NASA Sun & Space (@NASASun) January 28, 2019

OSIRIS-REx – Imaging Asteroid Bennu

As I fly around Bennu during Orbital A, my scientific cameras are not collecting data. But my NavCam 1 imager is taking "OpNav" (short for optical navigation) images like these to help monitor my path around the asteroid.

Image details ➡️ https://t.co/BLXn6GU6My pic.twitter.com/ZCTjYVxpnu

— NASA's OSIRIS-REx (@OSIRISREx) January 23, 2019

Landsat

Here’s a couple recent examples of Earth science being performed by the Landsat satellites:

ICYMI [journal article]
Combining Landsat observations with hydrological modelling for improved surface water monitoring of small lakeshttps://t.co/Ipa1SWdhY4#Landsat pic.twitter.com/4bYgjnZeOx

— NASA Landsat Program (@NASA_Landsat) January 28, 2019

ICYMI [journal article]
Detecting ebb-tidal delta migration using Landsat imageryhttps://t.co/0grp8nklh2#Landsat pic.twitter.com/tl2tru9zMc

— NASA Landsat Program (@NASA_Landsat) January 28, 2019

Exoplanet
TESS now has two!

All Exoplanets 3890
Confirmed Planets with Kepler Light Curves for Stellar Host 2346
Confirmed Planets Discovered by Kepler 2335
Kepler Project Candidates Yet To Be Confirmed 2424
Confirmed Planets with K2 Light Curves for Stellar Host 388
Confirmed Planets Discovered by K2 359
K2 Candidates Yet To Be Confirmed 473
Confirmed Planets Discovered by TESS 2

Need more space in your life? Download the #NASA_App on your device for the latest NASA images, videos, news and more: https://t.co/it6xUEEc93 pic.twitter.com/qao0MVzIB9

— NASA Ames (@NASAAmes) January 28, 2019

In other news: I’ve been playing with my VR headset after returning from Tucson, and just found Google Earth VR – where you can “fly like a drone” anywhere on the Earth. Some areas are built up with full 3D models, others are flattened satellite images. My wife launched into Zion Canyon and said “Oh WOW! I can see why Mom said we have to go here!”

Now, if I could “fly like a drone” anywhere over the surfaces of the Moon, Ceres and asteroids Vesta and Bennu – THAT would be super cool!

@googleearth VR BLEW my wife and I away!

The 3D model of Castel Gandolfo was impressive! Unfortunately, the VATT, and Large Binocular Telescope were flattened images…

A fellow Solar System Ambassador asked if there was a "Google Moon VR?"@EarthOutreach @GoogleForEdu pic.twitter.com/eo8S9zvwsf

— AstroBalrog (@AstroBalrog) January 29, 2019


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
The Universe – Universe Today


APOLLO 50th Anniversary July 20, 2019 is the 50th Anniversary of the Apollo 11 landing on the Moon.
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More Posts in this Series:
"In the Sky This Week"

78  |  What Do We Lose When We Sacrifice Science?

By Br. Guy Consolmagno  |  27 May 2021  |  Sacred Space Astronomy

69  |  To err is human… to admit it, is science

By Br. Guy Consolmagno  |  25 Mar 2021  |  Sacred Space Astronomy

139  |  In the Sky This Week – March 19, 2019

By Robert Trembley  |  19 Mar 2019

141  |  In the Sky This Week – December 4, 2018

By Robert Trembley  |  4 Dec 2018

142  |  In the Sky This Week – March 24, 2020

By Robert Trembley  |  24 Mar 2020

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