Starship Asterisk*

Moonlady wrote:Up again to watch Jupiter and Venus rising and the bonus of ISS! Sharp at 04:15 o'clock.
But this time there was a satellite in the trail of ISS, I thought usually satellites orbit from north to south,
which I observed in the past many, and if its from west to east, it's rare and they are spy/ military satellites :?:

You saw the Russian Progress supply ship, following the ISS in nearly the same orbit. It will dock on Sunday. There's another supply ship arriving tomorrow... if you're lucky, you might see all three spacecraft together.

Chris Peterson wrote:[
You saw the Russian Progress supply ship, following the ISS in nearly the same orbit. It will dock on Sunday. There's another supply ship arriving tomorrow... if you're lucky, you might see all three spacecraft together.

Thanks Chris for telling me! The sky is most of the time cloudy now, but maybe I still have the chance to spott the supply ships, that would be great!

I tried to find any information about current and future ISS expedition and mission dates in the net, most informations are about past missions.
From where does the second supply ship launch?

Moonlady wrote:From where does the second supply ship launch?

It was launched from Japan on 21 July. The cargo carrier is called HTV3.

I watched the Perseids Meteors, 7 Meteors in 45 minutes. They are so fast. I even convinced one of my friends to go out at 4 o'clock outside with me.
Besides the Perseids Meteors, the old moon made a beautiful scene with Jupiter, Aldebaran, Venus and Plejades.

I'm going back to work today, so I got up at an ungodly hour. Then I sat for almost an hour composing a post for Starship Asterisk*, and then I decided to go and look out my kitchen window, in case there was anything interesting to see out there. A Perseid, maybe?

The first thing I saw was the vaguely brownish color that means an overcast sky. I was about to turn on the lights when something brilliant caught my eye. There, over on the right side of the sky as seen from my kitchen window, was a sharp, brilliant, lovely white crescent of the Moon. And to the upper right of the Moon was a brilliant planet... Venus? Goodness, I had no idea what you can see in the sky these days, because it was so long since I had a look!

There was a bright yellow-orange light below the brilliant light of Venus(?). And there were small stars in the vicinity of the yellow-orange light. Oh, Aldebaran and the Hyades! And there, high in the sky even farther to the right, was the lovely Pleiades!

Suddenly a brilliant white light appeared at the upper left, as the clouds parted. What was it? So bright, so white? Oh, Capella!

And my goodness me! Now the clouds parted below the Moon! And yet another, even more brilliant light burst forth! Wait, this must be Venus! So what was that other light to the upper right? Oh, Jupiter!

Wow! What a show! It was as if the clouds parted to show first one, then another, then yet another of the brilliant lights in the east this morning.

Ann

Yesterday morning the sky was mostly cloudy, but where the clouds broke up the sky was brilliantly clear. The bright stars and planets emerged from the clouds like dazzling spotlights.

Today there are no clouds, but the sky is misty. You mean that puny light up there is Jupiter?

Later the crescent Moon rose, tagging after Venus. This pair looked good. Yet, the Moon was all "soft" from the mist.

Ann

Cheer-up, Ann, you'll always have yesterday. No amount of mist can take that away!

My dog woke me to take her out for potty call this morning just before dawn! The moon Jupiter and Venus were very nice!

Clouds, clouds, clouds, clouds, and occasionally, rain.

Very tragic year for wildfires in the lower 48. For we westerners (Colorado), this translates into hazy skies all summer long. Glimpses of ANYTHING have been few and far between. Visited a friend In Kiowa (55 miles SE of Denver) a few weeks back and had the pleasure of a relatively cloudless dark sky for a few hours -- the Milky Way was its usual grand self, with the Messiers on beautiful display. Have not done any imaging from my home-based station, but hope that Autumn's cold fronts will clear the air and reveal the Gulf region of the North America Nebula for many hours of H-alpha data collection -- News at 11.

I went camping last weekend. Beautiful, dark clear skies. A few of us stayed up Saturday night and saw some great Perseids. I'd say we saw - on average - one every minute or two. Quite a few "big ones" - that is, nice long debris trails lasting a second or more.

T'was a great show indeed!

owlice wrote:Clouds, clouds, clouds, clouds, and occasionally, rain.

owlice; send some of that rain this way!

Haze finally decreasing in Denver area -- maybe some imaging soon?? Time will tell -- been an interesting summer.

Jupiter, Venus....and Orion! I expected it more at the left side of Venus , northeast, but it's in the east.

I think i just saw the sattellite the ISS released, going from nnw to sse, for a little bit, until it dimed and faded out. I just checked the path of the ISS, and it is just off the upper east coast of South America, along the same path.

Walking the dogs through the fields at dusk this evening, about half-eight, the gibbous moon hanging quite low towards the south . . . Tranquility and Serenity showing clearly . . I tipped my wink to a truly great man. Somehow, that quarter million miles seems a little further than it did before.

It's a misty night, and all the bright lights in the sky are less bright than usual, and they are all surrounded by halos. Jupiter and Capella, which I see from my kitchen window, are surrounded by white to yellow-white halos - interestingly, Capella's halo looks just a touch yellower than Jupiter's. Maybe it's my imagination.

From my balcony I'm looking at the Summer Triangle. Altair's halo is white with a faint touch of blue in it. Deneb is basically the same color. Vega, however, is quite noticeably the bluest of the lot - there is no mistaking the baby blue-white hue of its cocoon.

Ann

Was a clear night so I got to see the blue moon!

Lots of very impressive lightning, and then a deluge.

In the latest Recent Submissions thread, Seantos wrote:

The morning sky has been looking incredible lately...lots of objects in the night sky.

Indeed! This morning was spectacular. It was so perfectly calm. There was no wind, and the city was basically still asleep. (Well, it was around 5.10 a.m.). There was an amazing sense of tranquility as the cloudless, blue-black sky stretched over the darkened, still-green late-summer cityscape, with the celestial little points of light from all the familiar winter constellations except Canis Major - I didn't see Sirius - serenely twinkling down at us. There was an elegant waning Moon crescent hanging below brilliant Venus, and the Earthshine on the Moon was quite incredible. The Sun-unlit limb of the Moon almost seemed to be aglow.

Ann

Ann wrote:The Sun-unlit limb of the Moon almost seemed to be aglow.

I think it was basking in your adoration, Ann.

Beyond wrote:

Ann wrote:The Sun-unlit limb of the Moon almost seemed to be aglow.

I think it was basking in your adoration, Ann.

Prolly!

I just learnt that word from a text we use at school - apparently it means "probably"! (At least in parts of Great Britain!)

Ann

This thread is 100 % depressing. I live in So.California / Los Angeles

Wow!!! The sun looks strikingly red this evening, with a layer of clouds below it, giving it a half-sun appearance. Beautiful!

Last night, before bed, Cassiopeia pointed the way to Andromeda. Just now, earlier than I usually get up, there were Venus glaring bright, Jupiter and a few of its moons, the Pleiades, Aldebaran and its friends, and Orion trying to corral them all. It was a rare clear night here!

Rob