School’s Out for Summer
I cannot help but hear those words sung by Alice Cooper… My wife is out of school for the summer, and our granddaughter is with us as I write this, soon to be whisked off to swimming lessons.
Connie is teaching astronomy again next year (yea!) but this time it will be for 23 weeks! She has to update her curriculum for this class and add a bunch of material – I suggested that amount of time might actually be enough to teach the very basics of astronomy adequately.
Both the Great Lakes Association of Astronomy Clubs and the Warren Astronomical Society are discussing when we will return to in-person events; a lot depends on the requirements of the metroparks and state parks. There has been discussion of requesting attendees be fully vaccinated, but there’s no way to verify that status. I don’t know how comfortable other presenters would be at this time operating a telescope publicly, but I’d rather not… not yet…
Jupiter and Saturn appear in the southern sky before dawn – Jupiter’s distance from Saturn widening each week.
Mars and Venus appear above the western horizon at dusk all week – getting closer towards each other over the week. The Waxing Crescent Moon appears high above the horizon and to the south on June 15th.
The Moon appears in conjunction with the star Spica after sunset in the southwestern sky on June 22nd.
The Moon appears near the constellation Scorpius in the southern sky after sunset on June 22nd – heading towards a conjunction with Antares on June 23rd.
The Big Dipper appears low about the northwestern horizon in the wee hours of the morning.
- The Moon is a Waxing Crescent – visible to the southwest in the early evening.
- The First Quarter Moon occurs on June 17th – it will be visible high in the southern sky in early evening.
- After June 17th, the Moon will be a Waxing Gibbous – visible to the southeast in early evening, and up for most of the night.
If you click on the Moon image above, or click this link, you will go to NASA’s Moon Phase and Libration, 2021 page – it will show you what the Moon looks like right now. If you click the image on that page, you will download a high-rez TIFF image annotated with the names of prominent features – helpful for logging your lunar observations!
Moon News:
A commenter suggested naming him “Jebediah” in reference to a pilot in Kerbal Space Program – I could not agree more!
The Sun has 2 spots – sunspot AR2824 (mentioned in my May 25 post) is returning after rotating around the Sun’s far side; per tradition, the sunspot has been renumbered as AR2833.
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.
Solar Activity on Facebook – Run by Volunteer NASA/JPL Solar System Ambassador Pamela Shivak
Solar Corona
Solar wind speed is 373.4 km/sec ▼, with a density of 33.2 protons/cm3 ▲▲▲ at 1141 UT.
NOTE: I believe this is the highest I’ve ever seen the density of the solar wind!
Click here to see a near real-time animation of the corona and solar wind from the Solar & Heliospheric Observatory (SOHO).
Sun News:
I show a “Coronal Rain” video during my Sun lecture – YUP! It rains on the Sun… Hot plasma rain, but so what?
- Near-Earth Objects (NEOs) discovered this month: 102, this year: 1231 (+70), all time: 26,064 (+69)
- Potentially hazardous asteroids: 2183 (+1) (updated 2021-06-15)
- Total Minor Planets discovered (NASA): 1,095,225 (+3,394)
- Total Minor Planets discovered (MPC): 1,088,252 (+18,346) (updated 2021-06-15)
Upcoming Earth-asteroid encounters:
| Asteroid | Date(UT) | Miss Distance | Velocity (km/s) | Diameter (m) |
| 2021 LV5 | 2021-Jun-15 | 11.8 LD | 11 | 16 |
| 2021 LF6 | 2021-Jun-16 | 3.7 LD | 1.7 | 7 |
| 2021 LY4 | 2021-Jun-16 | 2.3 LD | 11 | 22 |
| 2021 LL6 | 2021-Jun-18 | 4.4 LD | 9.9 | 15 |
| 2021 LE4 | 2021-Jun-21 | 4.7 LD | 13.8 | 30 |
| 2021 LS5 | 2021-Jun-22 | 9.2 LD | 9.5 | 26 |
| 441987 | 2021-Jun-25 | 15.6 LD | 13.4 | 187 |
| 2021 JT8 | 2021-Jun-25 | 20.1 LD | 7.5 | 69 |
| 2021 LV2 | 2021-Jun-26 | 4.6 LD | 7.4 | 30 |
| 2021 LD6 | 2021-Jun-28 | 10.6 LD | 2.1 | 12 |
| 2021 GM4 | 2021-Jul-01 | 12.1 LD | 6.3 | 150 |
| 2021 LG3 | 2021-Jul-03 | 19.4 LD | 8.6 | 84 |
| 2020 AD1 | 2021-Jul-04 | 2.8 LD | 4.9 | 20 |
| 2019 AT6 | 2021-Jul-13 | 4.2 LD | 5.1 | 11 |
| 2019 NB7 | 2021-Jul-17 | 15.2 LD | 13.8 | 12 |
| 2014 BP43 | 2021-Jul-21 | 17 LD | 8.5 | 18 |
| 2008 GO20 | 2021-Jul-24 | 12.8 LD | 8.2 | 123 |
| 2020 BW12 | 2021-Jul-27 | 16.7 LD | 9.8 | 21 |
| 2019 YM6 | 2021-Jul-31 | 17.9 LD | 13.5 | 135 |
| 2020 PN1 | 2021-Aug-03 | 9.6 LD | 4.6 | 30 |
| 2020 PP1 | 2021-Aug-03 | 13 LD | 3.6 | 16 |
| 2012 BA35 | 2021-Aug-11 | 6.9 LD | 4.2 | 62 |
Asteroid News:
On June 8, 2021, the NASA All Sky Fireball Network reported 21 fireballs!
(20 sporadics, 1 Northern June Aquilid)
Fireball News:
If you see a bright meteor or a fireball, please REPORT IT to the American Meteor Society and the International Meteor Organization!
Position of the planets & several spacecraft in the inner solar system on June 8th:
Position of the planets in the middle solar system – the orbit of asteroid 243 Ida is highlighted:
Position of the planets, and a several transneptunian objects in the outer solar system:
Solar System News:
See a list of current NASA missions here: https://www.jpl.nasa.gov/missions/?type=current
ex·o·plan·et /ˈeksōˌplanət/, noun: a planet orbiting a star other than the Sun.
Data from the NASA Exoplanet Archive
* Confirmed Planets Discovered by TESS refers to the number planets that have been published in the refereed astronomical literature.
* TESS Project Candidates refers to the total number of transit-like events that appear to be astrophysical in origin, including false positives as identified by the TESS Project.
* TESS Project Candidates Yet To Be Confirmed refers to the number of TESS Project Candidates that have not yet been dispositioned as a Confirmed Planet or False Positive.
Exoplanet News:
How Artificial Light Pollution and Noise Influence Bird Abundance Across the U.S.
- Visit an International Dark Sky Park: https://www.darksky.org/our-work/conservation/idsp/parks/
- If you live in Michigan, visit the Michigan Dark Skies site: https://sites.lsa.umich.edu/darkskies/
Beautiful Universe: NGC 7049
The Hubble Space Telescope captured this image of NGC 7049 in the constellation of Indus, in the southern sky. Globular clusters are sprinkled across the galaxy’s halo, and dust lanes are backlit by millions of stars.
I can’t recall having seen NGC 7049 before – I LOVE finding new and interesting astronomical objects like this!
View NGC 7049 on the WorldWide Telescope
NGC 7049 appears very similar to the Sombrero Galaxy, that I featured last week, only tipped at more of an angle towards us.
Stay safe, be well, and look up!
Software 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.
SpaceEngine: a free 3D Universe Simulator for Windows. Steam version with VR support available.
Stellarium: a free open source planetarium app for PC/MAC/Linux. It’s a great tool for planning observing sessions. A web-based version of Stellarium is also available.
