The Moon appears in the southwestern predawn sky near Jupiter on May 1st, and makes it way between Mars and Saturn in the southern sky on May 5th.
Southern sky at 5:00 AM, May 1, 2018. Credit: Stellarium / Bob Trembley.
Southern sky at 5:00 AM, May 5, 2018. Credit: Stellarium / Bob Trembley.Ursa Major (and the Big Dipper) are in the northwestern predawn sky, and Arcturus is bright in the western sky.
Western sky at 5:00 AM, May 5, 2018. Credit: Stellarium / Bob Trembley.Venus remains low in the western sky near sunset.
Western sky at 9:00 PM, May 1, 2018. Credit: Stellarium / Bob Trembley.Jupiter can be seen rising the in the eastern sky after sunset.
Eastern sky at 10:00 PM, May 1, 2018. Credit: Stellarium / Bob Trembley.Jupiter will be at opposition on May 9th – its face will be fully illuminated by the Sun, and it will be visible all night long! Sidewalk astronomers from around the world do a collective dance of joy!
Jupiter at Opposition May 9 2018. Credit: NASA Eyes on the Solar System / Bob Trembley.The Moon
The Moon May 1-7 2018. Visualizations by Ernie WrightThe Moon is a waning gibbous just past full; the Moon will be at third quarter on the 8th; May 7-10th would be good days to do some early morning sidewalk astronomy at schools!
The Sun
The Sun has been spot-free for 2 days. There are coronal holes at both poles, and a small hole on the equator. There is an area with quite a bit of coronal loop activity rotating out of view on the Sun’s limb. SpaceWeather.com says: “Solar wind flowing from this equatorial coronal hole should reach Earth on May 5th or 6th.” The solar wind speed is 409 km/sec, with a density of 4.0 protons/cm3.
Over the last couple days, several small prominences in the Sun’s chromosphere appear and vanish all over the Sun’s limb; the equatorial coronal hole appears as a dark smudge, and the area of coronal loop activity above appears as the bright orange region in the image below.
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.
Asteroids
Upcoming Earth-asteroid encounters:
| Asteroid |
Date(UT)
|
Miss Distance
|
Velocity (km/s)
|
Diameter (m)
|
| 2018 HB1 |
2018-May-02
|
10.1 LD
|
9.2
|
38
|
| 2018 HR1 |
2018-May-04
|
17.4 LD
|
16.4
|
50
|
| 1999 FN19 |
2018-May-07
|
9.7 LD
|
5.7
|
118
|
| 2016 JQ5 |
2018-May-08
|
6.3 LD
|
10.4
|
9
|
| 388945 |
2018-May-09
|
6.5 LD
|
9
|
295
|
| 2018 GR2 |
2018-May-11
|
13.4 LD
|
9.8
|
109
|
| 1999 LK1 |
2018-May-15
|
13.3 LD
|
10
|
141
|
| 2018 GL1 |
2018-May-18
|
14.3 LD
|
5.2
|
66
|
| 68347 |
2018-May-29
|
9.5 LD
|
13.3
|
389
|
| 2013 LE7 |
2018-May-31
|
17.8 LD
|
1.7
|
12
|
| 2018 EJ4 |
2018-Jun-10
|
5.6 LD
|
6.2
|
195
|
| 2015 DP155 |
2018-Jun-11
|
9 LD
|
4.4
|
170
|
| 2017 YE5 |
2018-Jun-21
|
15.6 LD
|
15.5
|
513
|
| 467309 |
2018-Jun-23
|
17.9 LD
|
14
|
355
|
| 441987 |
2018-Jun-24
|
7.3 LD
|
12.6
|
178
|
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: 0, this year: 633, all time: 18185.
Potentially hazardous asteroids: 1907 (as of May 1, 2018)
Minor Planets discovered: 757,626 (as of May 1, 2018)
Fireballs
On Apr. 30, 2018, the NASA All Sky Fireball Network reported 8 fireballs.
In this diagram of the inner solar system, all of the fireball orbits intersect at a single point–Earth.The Solar System
This is the position of the planets in the solar system:
Position of the planets in the inner solar system, May 1, 2018. Credit: NASA Eyes on the Solar System / Bob Trembley.
Position of the planets in the inner and middle solar system, May 1, 2018. Credit: NASA Eyes on the Solar System / Bob Trembley.Exoplanets
Confirmed Exoplanets: 3,725 (4/26/2018)
Multi-Planet Systems: 613 (4/26/2018)
Kepler Candidate Exoplanets: 4,496 (8/31/2017)
TESS Candidate Exoplanets: 0
Data from the NASA Exoplanet Archive
The Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS) launched on April 18, 2018 on a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket. TESS is the successor to the Kepler space telescope. From the TESS website:
TESS will discover thousands of exoplanets in orbit around the brightest stars in the sky. In a two-year survey of the solar neighborhood, TESS will monitor more than 200,000 stars for temporary drops in brightness caused by planetary transits. This first-ever spaceborne all-sky transit survey will identify planets ranging from Earth-sized to gas giants, around a wide range of stellar types and orbital distances. No ground-based survey can achieve this feat.
The Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS). Credit: NASA Eyes on the Solar System / Bob Trembley.You can view simulations of exoplanets and exoplanet systems in the Eyes on Exoplanets module of the NASA Eyes on the Solar System app.
Apps used for this post:
Stellarium: a free open source planetarium app for PC/MAC/Linux. It’s a great tool for planning observing sessions.
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.
