A General Astronomy Thread

[Fishy]

Six planets on show in celestial 'parade'  https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c4g3l0yzyxdo

Too cloudy here tonight...

[Slim]

Didn't know this until just now but Halley's Comet is on its way back, already.

Persons of a certain age will remember its last visit in 1986. I can remember sitting in a coffee bar at Teesside Poly and watching a news item about it. A woman had bought a t-shirt for her kid with the text "I'll See It Again in 2061!"

That kid will be about 45 now. Anyway as of December 9th 2023, it's getting closer again.

https://www.livescience.com/space/comets/halleys-comet-begins-its-return-journey-to-earth-saturday

[Fishy]

Venus has been really bright..late evening looking west.. lovely

[Fishy]

Venus really bright again tonight..

[Fishy]

Oldest known meteor shower to light up UK skies this week https://www.bbc.co.uk/weather/articles/c1d902y90g5o

[Fishy]

Lovely crescent moon with Venus just below in a clear sky tonight

[Slim]

Just had a look at Jupiter through binoculars - you can just about make it out as a disk. But I couldn't see the Galilean moons.

[Nickslikk2112]

Just had a look at Jupiter through binoculars - you can just about make it out as a disk. But I couldn't see the Galilean moons.

I can with my not especially good binoculars. Maybe not yet dark enough, or they're aligned in front of and/or behind Jupiter.

[Slim]

Well - with the 500mm lens I did manage to get the moons. Top left: Ganymede. Just touching Jupiter at 4 o'clock - Europa. Then Io, and just faintly visible bottom-right, Callisto.

Notice the blur is oriented diagonally - that's the sky moving (so to speak), or more accurately, the Earth rotating. I used a 0.5 sec exposure at 400 ISO.

Highslide Image Viewer


A few minutes later I confirmed what I'd seen on Stellarium:

Highslide Image Viewer

[Fishy]

With lots of clear skies over the coming nights there is a good chance of seeing the Lyrid meteor shower.
While it has been ongoing since the 16 April, the peak is expected on Wednesday night.
Expect to see around 10 to 15 meteors an hour with surges of activity that could bring up to 100 an hour.
The Lyrid meteor shower is an annual event as a result of the Earth passing through dust left behind Comet Thatcher.

[Thenop]

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[Thenop]

While playing around with Google maps I zoomed out so far that I oened a menu on the left that let's you see all planets and moons in orbit of those planets, and you can zoom in as well. Never seen that feature, must've missed it before. This means I have more than one celestial body to marvel at up close and personal!

It let's you zoom in on the planets and moons, and even has the names of craters, just like a map of earth.
Screenshot to show you in over 20Mb, might just be best to check for yourself :-)

Edit: let's see if this works: direct link to Europa, the smallest moon of Jupiter:

Europa (moon of Jupiter)

[pxr5]

^ Just tried it, interesting. I had to turn on Globe View in maps to get it to work.