Nov. 30 is your last chance to get a glimpse of the International Space Station (ISS) as it flies around the Earth this year. You don’t even need a telescope to view it. Weather permitting, it should be visible to the naked eye throughout the US and Canada. The largest man-made object in space will appear as a bright light in the sky, and is much brighter than an average satellite orbiting the planet. On a good night, the station rivals the planet Venus in brightness and can appear up to 25 times brighter than Sirius, the brightest star in the night sky. On Monday, it won’t be quite that bright, but at a magnitude of -2.0, it will still still stand out amongst Venus and the brightest stars.
If you want to get a glimpse before it’s gone, check out SpaceWeather.com to get viewing times for your location. Simply enter your zip code and then look for ISS. SpaceWeather.com also tracks other satellites, the space shuttles, and Hubble Telescope. In fact, Atlantis flew over during the Thanksgiving holiday and was also visible to the naked eye. If you’ve never seen a space shuttle glide across the sky at night, it’s a neat sight. You can bookmark SpaceWeather.com and the next time the shuttle undocks from the ISS you can find out when (or if) it will be viewable from your location. Pretty cool, huh?
I never considered this until I read an article about it tonight. What if Earth had rings like Saturn? The unique bands circling Saturn make it one of the most beautiful and interesting planets to view. Even witnessed through a small, amateur telescope, it’s a cool sight.
Imagining what the rings would look like around around our planet is fairly easy. I don’t think it would appear much different than Saturn does today, but the interesting thing to consider is what the view would be when you are standing on the ground and looking up into the sky. What would you see? Well, a new video depicts what the rings might look like from different cities and latitudes across the world. It’s a mesmerizing sight. Check it out.
NASA is letting the public choose the name of its newest addition to the International Space Station (Node 3 and its cupola). According to the NASA website, the “name should reflect the spirit of exploration and cooperation embodied by the space station, and follow in the tradition set by Node 1-Unity and Node 2-Harmony.”
The cupola will be delivered to the space station in December and will offer spectacular views of Earth. Six rectangular windows and one circular window will offer a panoramic view unrivaled by any other spacecraft ever flown. The cupola will also contain a robotics workstation to allow astronauts to control the giant robotic arm of the space station. Node 3 will house many of the station’s life support systems.
The leading names are:
Earthrise
Legacy
Serenity
Venture
However, you can suggest a name if you think you have a better one. One of my favorite “write-in” names is Tranquility, but since I’m a huge Joss Whedon fan, I’ve got to stick with Serenity. It’s the name of Whedon’s 2005 movie which was the continuation of a short-lived scifi series on Fox. Serenity was also the name of the cargo ship that transported the characters around the ‘verse. It’s just so fitting for the space station.
Voting is open through March 20, and the winning name will be announced in April. I’ve already placed my vote. To register yours, click here.
Gazing at the night sky this week will give you a rare glimpse of an unusual comet. Lulin, a green, backward-flying comet, is on its closest (and possibly final) approach to Earth. Lulin is 38 million miles away, but in dark locations, you can see it with the naked eye. In the city, binoculars are all that’s needed. To the naked eye, the comet looks like a fuzzy patch of hazy light. With binoculars or a telescope, you should be able to see the comet’s brighter center, along with its dual tail.
Comet Lulin is remarkable because it travels backward around the sun in the opposite direction of the planets. Because of this, it appears to move in relation to the stars while you watch, something you don’t get to see very often.
To find Lulin, look high in the southeast sky for big, bright Saturn. Comet Lulin will be a fuzzy smudge slightly above and to the right of the planet. Refer to the chart below courtesy of Sky and Telescope.
If you miss it tonight, Lulin will still be visible the rest of the week. And if you miss it altogether, you could be out of luck. Astronomers aren’t sure Lulin will ever reappear in the inner solar system.
For the past couple of nights, the sky has put on a spectacular show. Venus, Jupiter, and the slender crescent moon have converged in a rare conjunction to form a tight triangle or “smiley” face.
The moon is the brightest object, closest and smallest of the three and is 252,000 miles away. Venus, the second brightest, closest and smallest, is 94 million miles away. And Jupiter, the largest, is 540 million miles away.
The three celestial objects come together from time to time, but often they are too close to the sun or unite at a time when they aren’t so visible. The next time the three will be as close and visible as this week will be Nov. 18, 2052, according to Jack Horkheimer, director of the Miami Space Transit Planetarium.
Some historians think that a similar conjunction between Jupiter and Venus in 2 B.C. may be the source of the “star of Bethlehem” story related in the Bible. The stellar pair would have appeared so close together, scholars think, that they might have seemed to meld into one brilliant beacon of light.
It’s a beautiful sight, and you don’t even need a set of binoculars or a telescope to appreciate it. The two planets will remain together tomorrow night, but the moon will begin to move away. If you haven’t witnessed the conjunction yet, glance up on Tuesday night and enjoy.
Loading ...
