Starship Asterisk*

Highlights of the Summer Sky

Explanation: What's up in the sky this summer? The featured graphic gives a few highlights for Earth's northern hemisphere. Viewed as a clock face centered at the bottom, early summer sky events fan out toward the left, while late summer events are projected toward the right. Objects relatively close to Earth are illustrated, in general, as nearer to the cartoon figure with the telescope at the bottom center -- although almost everything pictured can be seen without a telescope. Highlights of this summer's sky include that Jupiter will be visible after sunset during June, while Saturn will be visible after sunset during August. A close grouping of the Moon, Venus and the bright star Aldebaran will occur during mid-July. In early August, the Perseids meteor shower peaks. Surely the most famous pending astronomical event occurring this summer, though, will be a total eclipse of the Sun visible over a thin cloud-free swath across the USA on 21 August.

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Jupiter and Saturn will both be visible after sunset, for virtually all of June, July and August, except perhaps for those at rather northern latitudes, with very long summer days.

Saturn will be at opposition next Thursday, in the height of its own northern summer. It has all year been culminating in my (southern hemisphere) sky, at an elevation angle approaching 85 degrees, which is about as south as it can get. So it may be less than ideal (but still good) for those north of the Tropic of Cancer, wanting to obtain the best views/images of Saturn's details. Can anyone detect a note of jealousy, that I will be missing the solar eclipse in August?

If the distance from the cartoon observer at bottom center represents the distance from earth that the celestial events will be occurring, this pic denoting the Perseids out past Saturn really changes my perception about how close meteor showers are from us....

And to think that some people are afraid of meteorites bonking them on the head...

ps - yeah, I know, it says "in general". But I couldn't help a little tongue in cheek for what is my favorite meteor shower...

This was the astronomy picture of the day??? Ugly!

firstmagnitude wrote:This was the astronomy picture of the day??? Ugly!

It wasn't meant to be pretty. It IS VERY informative however.

Thanks for posting it.

Bruce

Had to look up Earth's Moon's Golden Handle ...

Coil_Smoke wrote:Had to look up Earth's Moon's Golden Handle ...

Have you seen Lunar X yet?
It's only visble for 3 or 4 hours before 1st quarter. There is some discussion and pictures on at Cloudynights

For me that picture is pretty. Really!